


Sands of Time

by CoffeeQuill



Series: What It Takes [2]
Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Adorable Baby Yoda (The Mandalorian TV), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Bigotry & Prejudice, Blood and Violence, Bonding, Bounty Hunters, Crushes, Flirting, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, ManDadlorian, Mandalorian Cobb Vanth, Mandalorian Culture, Mando!Cobb, Mutual Pining, Nightmares, Past Abuse, Past Torture, Romantic Fluff, Slow Burn, Swimming, Training, Tusken Raiders (Star Wars)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-03
Updated: 2021-02-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:49:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 44,975
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27368347
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CoffeeQuill/pseuds/CoffeeQuill
Summary: Vanth put his hands up quickly in a surrender. “I’m not asking for it back,” he said. “Your code says it’s yours. You did your half of our deal and then some. But you taking it leaves me without any armor at all. I’m going to needsomething.And with your answers of how people have joined the Mandalorians… you said I’d make a good one.”Din leaned back.---In the aftermath, Vanth makes a request that Din finds himself unwilling to deny. With brewing feelings, he agrees to train him as a Mandalorian, and both set foot on a winding path together. Sequel to Little Talks.
Relationships: Baby Yoda (The Mandalorian TV) & Cobb Vanth, Baby Yoda (The Mandalorian TV) & Din Djarin, Din Djarin & Cara Dune, Din Djarin & Omera, Din Djarin & Winta, Din Djarin/Cobb Vanth, Din Djarin/Omera
Series: What It Takes [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1999120
Comments: 434
Kudos: 920





	1. Inquiries

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The question is asked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> People enjoyed [Little Talks](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27338356) enough, and I had the inspiration to continue! I'm not only deep in this ship but I have the relentless desire to see Cobb become a Mandalorian with Din. It's... a need. The rating is currently General, but that may go up in the future with ample warning ahead of any such chapters.
> 
> Chat with me!  
> New Sands of Time [discord](https://discord.gg/zEwyCKqrcB)  
> My [Tumblr](https://coffeequill.tumblr.com/) (I switched tumblrs! if you were following before, you might not be now.)  
> My [Twitter](https://twitter.com/coffee_quill)

“Sorry. I didn’t have time to explain.”

“No need.” Vanth had a smile on his face as he set the jetpack on the speeder, and Din reached out to grab hold of it, the cuirass and pauldrons all tied to it. Vanth lifted the helmet and held it out. “This was well earned.”

Din took the helmet and settled it on top of the jetpack. “It was my pleasure,” he said. As Vanth stuck his hand out, Din shook it. The gesture felt distanced, businesslike, not the… closeness he had almost allowed himself to feel. Din sucked in a breath.

Being handed the armor did not feel like some victory. It should have — he should have been satisfied that he’d reclaimed beskar from an outsider. He should have felt pride in himself for not just retrieving the armor of a fallen brother but slaying a krayt dragon. Yet, this exchange didn’t feel so… _clean._ It didn’t feel like he’d won.

“I hope our paths cross again.”

“As do I.”

Their hands let go. Din’s stomach was a fluttering mess.

_Pull yourself together, Djarin._

“Oh, and—” Vanth turned around again, pointing to the jetpack. “You tell your people I wasn’t the one that broke that.”

Din allowed himself a small smile. Vanth turned back and started walking towards his people where they continued to celebrate, and Din let his eyes drift back down towards the armor. The baby cooed, but Din lifted the helmet and looked into the visor. It had not escaped his notice that Vanth knew how to use the gear — knew how to use it well. He was no true Mandalorian, but there had been an impressive amount of skill that… could be expanded on.

_What does it take to be a Mandalorian, anyway?_

He began to strap down the armor. The baby made another coo, staring at him, and his mind began to probe at Din’s to seek answers. Din blanked his thoughts, focusing only on tying the rope securely to keep everything in place. “Before the suns set,” he murmured. They needed to get moving. He swept up the baby to settle him in the speeder bag.

The baby made a sad trill but did not resist it, ears down as he looked up at Din.

“No. We can’t stay.”

There was no reason to, at least, not a good one. The dragon was dead, he had the armor. Time to go. He had a near-impossible quest in front of him, anyway, and he didn’t want to lose any more time than he already had chasing leads that wouldn’t really get him anywhere. With the armor secured, he began on the meat.

“Aah!”

“Shh, _ad’ika.”_

The baby quieted, tucking himself down in the bag.

Din found himself not feeling any happier. The fluttering that Vanth caused in his stomach had not gone away and he instead felt almost an ache in his chest. He _did not_ want to leave like this. He looked again towards the celebrating villagers, saw Vanth laugh and give hugs back, and the emotion in his chest was…

_No._

He made sure the meat was staying in place before he climbed onto the bike. The baby made another whimper, but Din revved the engine. He was about to press on the pedal, sending them shooting off into the desert, when another voice called out.

_“-Mando!”_

Din froze. He looked to the side and saw Vanth jogging over, slowing when he saw he had Din’s attention, and the marshal strode over. He was slightly out of breath as he stopped. “Stay,” he said, setting his hands on his hips.

Din stared at him. “What?”

“Stay. A lil’ longer. We’re gonna celebrate this tonight — you should join us. Let us—”

“I can’t—”

 _“Let us_ feed ya, have a place to sleep. Suns will be down soon. You can set off in the morning, have the whole day to get back to Mos Eisley, and you’ll get to relax from nearly being _eaten_ by that thing. Let us be grateful, eh?”

“Your resources are thin as is.”

“Well, you got this deal for us. Raiders won’t be… well, raiding. Wouldn’t make the offer otherwise.” Vanth’s gaze turned down to the baby, who cooed up at him. “Call me selfish. I wanna see this lil guy a bit longer.”

The speeder rumbled beneath Din. For a long moment, they only sat in that space, silence between them as Din mulled it over. It was tempting. No part of him really desired to stay on Tatooine any longer than he had to, under burning suns and unbearable heat. But he also thought of how much his body currently ached, getting to put his feet up and sleep somewhere safe before finally driving back.

“Oh, come on.” Vanth grinned. “One more night. You’re gonna say no to lettin’ us reward you? Kid would like it.”

The baby babbled then, and Vanth chuckled, gesturing to the kid as though it were irrefutable proof.

Din gripped the handles of the speeder, then let out a breath. He couldn’t deny that Vanth being so close made his heart race. The baby was squirming, arms raised, and Vanth bent down to pick him up out of the bag. The kid wriggled to settle against his chest, softer now without the cuirass, and Vanth looked at Din with a smirk.

“Checkmate.”

“Aah!” 

The baby was smiling. _Little traitor._

Din sighed. “You got me,” he grumbled.

Din followed behind the townspeople at a slow pace. This journey was much slower than he would have been towards Mos Eisley, but he also would have been traveling a much more significant distance, and he was already sore. _Maybe this was a good idea._ He rested his wrists on the handlebars of the speeder, following alongside the banthas.

Vanth rode a bantha with the kid in his lap. The baby was delighted to be so high up and happily shrieked at Din as he looked down at him. Din waved. The baby giggled, and Vanth had a soft expression again for the kid. He adjusted the little one in his arms to keep him from slipping. Eventually, he was transferred back to Din.

There was a truce now between the humans and the Tuskens. Even following their victory, things did not seem much smoother; the people had still shied away from the Tuskens, only Din and Vanth willing to talk to them. And Vanth was still less enthusiastic. Din rolled his eyes, but knew that this sort of change wouldn’t come overnight, and Vanth was making the effort.

Upon reaching the town, the atmosphere of relief continued. Parents ran to the school building where the children had hunkered down to await them. Others headed to their homes for a change of clothing. “Drinks around!” someone else shouted, maybe Vanth, and when Din looked up there was already a group heading to the cantina, Vanth and the barkeep among them. Din took his time getting off the speeder with the baby in his arms. He desperately needed to clean off his armor, he thought.

“Mando! Come on!”

Din sighed, then walked over. He hesitated just before the door but walked inside, stepping up onto the platform and into the shade of the cantina. The Weequay had already gotten behind the bar, pulling out the stores of alcohol, and Din tried to assure himself that this would likely be happening regardless of his presence.

“Make sure everyone else knows!” Vanth shouted, and then he whipped around to see Din and he smiled. _“You_ should get at least a few drinks.”

“Helmet,” Din said.

“Shit, well—” Vanth paused. “Straw?”

Din paused at that. He’d already contented himself with passing on the alcohol, but… yes. “That could work,” he said. “I need to clean this off.”

Vanth looked him up and down, then nodded. “We’ve got water,” he said. “New clothes, too?”

“I have spares,” he said, suddenly glad for the extra flight suit he’d thought to tuck into his belongings on the speeder. As Vanth stepped out into the sunlight, Din followed. “Thank you.”

“Not a problem.” Vanth led him from the cantina and down the path. He stopped at a house on the end, reaching for the door button, which slid it open. Inside was dark, the lights flipped on, and as Vanth stepped inside, Din stared.

“This is your home?”

“Nothin’ special,” Vanth said, resting a hand on his belt.

The space was tiny. There was a small round table with one chair, a bed pushed into the corner with drawers beneath, and a mini kitchenette. It looked barely enough for Vanth alone in terms of space, but Din supposed that any cool space out of the sun was enough on Tatooine. Vanth walked to the kitchenette and crouched down to open the lower cabinet, turning something. 

Din stepped inside and the baby cooed. Standing in Vanth’s space felt… odd.

“Limited supply.” Vanth stood again and reached for the pipe faucet that protruded from the wall. Water sprayed from the faucet, quickly shut off again, and Vanth gave him a nod. “Just don’t drain it.”

“I won’t.”

Vanth stepped past him, careful to avoid brushing shoulders when Din was covered in dragon bile. Din stood in place. When Vanth had gone, he took a step outside again, watching the marshal go. Vanth disappeared back into the cantina, and Din headed to the speeder to fetch his spare clothing, returning again with the door shut behind him.

Din settled the kid down on the table, then began to undress down to his underclothes.

With his beskar and flight suit off, he felt a little less constricted. He turned the clothing inside out to keep from smearing the saliva over Vanth’s property and left it piled on the floor. The room felt nice and cool on his face, and the baby was content to sit and wait, blowing raspberries. Din grabbed a washcloth from the sink and turned the water on, just enough to wet the cloth. He took his cuirass first and began to wipe it clean.

“Asabah?”

Din looked over his shoulder at the baby, then back down to his beskar. The bile was still wet enough that it came easily. Once his cuirass was cleaned, he turned back to the rest of his armor, and saw the baby crawling towards the edge. “No,” he said, turning him around. The baby pouted. “Stay there.”

“Aah!”

“I know.”

He started on the vambraces. The baby was not content. Din moved a little faster, took a few more glances over his shoulder, because the damn kid would do as he pleased if he had the energy for such determination. He deactivated his vambraces but still cleaned with care, not trying to set off any of his stored weaponry. He scrubbed harder at a difficult spot, then heard scrabbling claws and a _thump—_

Din whipped around. The baby had fallen to the floor and sat now on his rump, staring back at Din, before the tears formed in his eyes. “Shit,” Din muttered, and he set his vambraces aside to swoop down and grab the kid. “I told you to stay.”

_“Abaa!”_

“Yeah, yeah, come here.”

The baby snuggled in against his neck, tucking beneath his jaw, and though he sniffled there was no tantrum. Din held him with one arm, and with a sigh, returned to cleaning sans one hand. The kid made a soft whine, claws brushing against Din’s skin.

“You have to learn,” Din said. “One day, I won’t be there.”

The weight of those words sat heavy. His adopted father had said similar to him, once; Din needed to learn to fend for himself, because there may come a day when he would have to. It meant even more for this child. There _would_ be a day, without question, that the boy would not have Din. They would be separated by the passage of time regardless of what they did.

If Din were successful in his quest, this day would come sooner.

He had to return the child.

The baby finally settled from his fall but kept himself glued to Din, watching what he was doing. Din wiped down the rest of his armor, at a slower pace than he wanted. He gave himself a brief wipe down with a new cloth and set the kid on the chair now to get his flight suit on.

The baby stayed seated. But as Din closed up his suit, he whimpered and began to squirm. He planted his hands on the chair and wriggled, almost like he was trying to stretch out, but his face had discomfort written all over it. He stopped, then whimpered again, as though his efforts were pointless in alleviating it. Din looked down at him with a frown.

“What is it?”

The baby made a trill, looking up at him and squirming some more.

“Are you itchy?”

The baby lifted his arms. Din scooped him up, then turned and settled him beside the sink. Sand had not been a problem during their last visit, but the baby had not really touched it then. Din undid the ties of his robe and tugged it off him, then the undersuit beneath. Grains of sand did fall then. “I see,” Din murmured, and he took gentle hold of the kid to also work off the fabric that made up a diaper. “It’s okay.”

He wet the cloth again. The baby was teary-eyed but he stood still, rocking in Din’s motions as he gently cleaned away remaining sand. Din lifted him beneath the faucet, letting a small stream of it run over the kid to catch anything still there, then quickly shut it off.

“Good?”

The kid stared up at him.

“We’ll take that as good.”

He found a folded towel on the bed that seemed freshly laundered and decided that Vanth liked the kid enough to not mind it being used. The baby giggled as Din toweled him dry and Din tried to make sure that sand was shaken out of his clothes. He didn’t have spares for the kid. All he had extra was armor and his own ruined attire, and nothing really on the bike.

Din kept him wrapped and settled him on the bed’s pillow. The baby cooed and squirmed but seemed content where he was. Din began to re-armor. Each piece of beskar settled into place, and he had to stand and shift and twist to feel it adjust properly, but it was good. Laughter passed the door outside and he looked over before turning back to the baby.

He was nearly asleep.

Din smiled. He walked over and knelt down beside the bed, resting a hand on the baby’s front, and sleepy eyes blinked at him. He twisted within the towel to lie on his belly, nuzzling his face into the pillow. His eyes were shut with finality and Din stroked his back a few times before he stood up. _“Jate ca,”_ he murmured, then stood again. It would be easier to spend time with the villagers but without worrying over the kid.

Vanth wouldn’t mind the kid also using his bed.

Din slipped his helmet back on and re-armed himself. He stepped out of the room and back into the sand, where the suns were beginning to set, and shut the door behind him. He shoved his soiled clothing back onto the speeder before he set off towards the cantina, which was already loud with noise, and walked inside.

_“Mando!”_

Someone shouted his name and the group cheered. Faced with sudden attention, Din nodded to them, eyes searching again for Vanth. He stepped into the crowd and walked to the bar, where the marshal and a few others were seated - Vanth sat at the end of them and Din spotted the drink beside him with a straw. Vanth twisted to see him, then gestured to the open seat.

“The kid?”

Din sat down. “He was falling asleep,” he said. “Put him in your bed, if you don’t mind.”

“Not at all.”

He pulled the drink close. The straw didn’t bend well, but he could tilt his helmet forward and it reached his mouth. The alc had a sharp bite to it, but tasted of fruit as well. It was nothing he’d had before, and made a mental note to not indulge too much. The last thing he needed was a hangover tomorrow when driving through a hot desert.

He didn’t need to get drunk now, either.

His judgment certainly… dropped when he was, especially in the presence of temptation.

“What’s next for you, then?”

He pulled back from the drink and glanced at Vanth. “I keep looking for Mandalorians,” he said. “Hope that the covert I find has connections to start me down a real path. Or that I can find someone from my tribe who survived.”

“You _have_ to find the kid’s people?”

Din paused. “Mandalorians often take people in,” he said. “Before the Purge — it wasn’t uncommon to marry an outsider. They’d become a Mandalorian. Or taking foundlings from places destroyed by war, to give them a family.”

“Kid’s a foundling.”

He nodded. “You can’t just take kids,” he said. “Only kids that don’t have anyone to return to. Priority is to return them. My family — they all perished in the attack on my home. I had no one but the Mandalorians. They had to search, first.”

Vanth leaned his cheek into his palm, then reached for his drink. “So you have to be sure that there’s no one for the kid to go back to,” he said. “Or he’s yours.”

Din paused again, biting his cheek. “The kid is fifty years old.”

Vanth had taken a sip but nearly choked, spitting it back into his cup. _“Fifty?”_ he demanded. “That thing seems like a toddler and he’s older than both of us?”

“How old are you?”

“Forty-eight.”

Din shifted. Alright, so Vanth had a handful or so of years on him. But that knowledge did nothing to sway the flutter in his stomach. “I’ve never seen his species before,” he said. “That’s what makes this difficult. His lifespan must be centuries.”

Vanth was quiet, taking another sip. “What of the armor, then?”

“The last owner is probably dead,” Din said. “If not, then they’ve lost their helmet and kit and aren’t Mandalorian anymore. When I find a covert, or my own Armorer, I’ll give it to them to remake.”

Vanth nodded and the sound of the townspeople behind them provided a calm ambiance. They sat in otherwise silence, Din’s thoughts turning as he sipped at his straw. He was warming up to the taste. He’d have to be hyperaware of feeling buzzed.

“So it’s normal for people to become Mandalorians.”

Din froze mid-sip and slowly eased off the straw, shifting in his seat. Vanth had made that inquiry during their night with the Tuskens. It wasn’t… entirely out of the blue. But it had seemed more of a joke then, a lighthearted question that wasn’t meant to lead to anything. But with context, it now sounded a bit more… serious.

“It was,” he conceded. His heart was starting to pick up, a nervousness in his hands, a worry of saying the wrong thing here. Vanth was looking at him now. “Spouses would convert to our way. Being warriors — you couldn’t afford to stay within.”

Vanth’s eyes drifted to his drink, expression thoughtful.

“You hide your face from a spouse, too?”

“No,” Din said quickly. “Immediate family — that’s the exception.”

His heart was pounding now. Certainly, he was reading far too into these questions. He should only chalk this up as curiosity from an outsider who wanted to understand. Vanth already had shown respect for the armor and for Din needing to take it, so this _must_ just be a further inquiry.

Vanth shifted his jaw. Din stared at him, then looked back down to his drink. _Maker,_ the fluttering would not go away in his stomach, and Vanth looked like he wanted to ask another question, and Din didn’t know what to _say—_

“I’ll miss the armor. Served pretty well.”

“You looked good in it,” Din blurted out.

_Fuck._

Vanth’s eyebrows raised and Din’s face reddened beneath the helmet, throat threatening to close with embarrassment. “When you fought,” he said quickly. “You looked — you knew how to move in it. The jetpack, that’s… it’s difficult to control that well without formal training.”

“You looked just as good,” Vanth said, a bit of a drawl to his voice that made Din’s heart seem to jump. “If not better.”

His gaze was too insistent with how it lingered. Din was breathless, humiliatingly so, and couldn’t believe he was feeling like a lovestruck teenager when he was almost forty years old. He hurriedly took a long sip of his drink to finish it off and then pushed himself to stand, desperately hoping his fluster didn’t shine through.

“I’m going to check on the kid,” he said, swallowing.

“I’ll come.”

_No._

Din just nodded and got off the chair. He started towards the door, Vanth at his back, and the suns had set lower now with the temperature falling. It felt better out here, and they were strolling towards Vanth’s home, side by side. Din was almost lightheaded. He couldn’t tell for sure if Vanth’s remark back at him had just been teasing mockery or actual…

 _Osik._ Strike him dead before he could make a bigger fool out of himself.

They came to the door and Vanth opened it. Inside was dark until the lights were switched and the baby was still in the bed, fast asleep. He shifted but did not wake. Desperate for a distraction, Din walked to the bed and sat beside it, reaching a hand to stroke the little one’s back. Small eyes peeled open to look at him, a soft coo escaping, before he was closing them again and turning back to sleep.

Vanth sat at the other end of the bed. They were silent, his eyes watching the exchange, and Din tried to let his heart calm down. He’d been much more put together when faced with his feelings for Omera. But Omera had not been so forward, either, and there hadn’t been… Omera had wanted him to stay, to shed his armor, asked something of him that was just not something he could give.

Vanth, now, wanted to armor up.

They sat in silence for a little while longer.

The drink had helped some. He didn’t feel buzzed, but he felt a little looser, some of his normal tension taken off. He continued to stroke the child’s back and ears, just for something to keep his hand busy, keep his focus off of saying another stupid thing he would regret. Vanth cleared his throat but didn’t speak. It could have been enjoyable company if not for the ridiculous amount of tension.

“I don’t want to beat around the question, Mando.”

Din looked at him.

“You seem like you spook easy about this sorta thing.”

He swallowed.

“The armor has helped me protect this town,” Vanth said, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. “Even with the dragon gone, and a pact with the Raiders, I don’t feel entirely confident that another threat won’t eventually come along. A threat I’d need to protect us from.”

Din shifted.

Vanth put his hands up quickly in a surrender. “I’m not asking for it back,” he said. “Your code says it’s yours. You did your half of our deal and then some. But you taking it leaves me without any armor at all. I’m going to need _something._ And with your answers of how people have joined the Mandalorians… you said I’d make a good one.”

Din tensed, pushing up from the bed. “My people are being tracked for slaughter,” he said. “Mandalorians are hunters and the hunted. Wearing the armor here, it’s — you can take it _off._ I can’t.” He took a breath. “I don’t think you realize what you’re asking.”

“I think I do,” Vanth said. “You said it’s possible.”

“Yes.”

“You’d be willing to help me do it?”

“... Yes, but—“

“Mando.” Vanth sighed. “I don’t want to make you do it. But this town’s safety has always been my priority. Even if you were willing to just _train_ me to fight as you can, if I could get that durasteel mockup you were talking about — it would be something. _Anything.”_

Din watched him. Vanth’s expression held certainty. Din took a deep breath to steady himself, _hating_ how off-center these feelings made him, and let his thoughts catch up. “I can… train you, at least,” he said. “But would you be willing to leave? Come off-world with me to train?”

“I think they could manage,” Vanth said. “If the Tuskens would be willing to… lend a hand.”

“You’d trust them with your town’s safety,” Din said, unable to bite back a smirk.

“So that I can train like a Mando? Got no choice.”

Din smiled. He looked towards the kid again, and something inside him began to feel more settled. He took a deep breath and turned his gaze back to Vanth.

“Alright,” he said. “Yes. We can see how it goes.”

“We got a deal, then?”

“We got a deal.”

Vanth grinned, then stood. “Come on, then,” he said. “If I’m leaving with you, this is my last night here, and it should be fun.”

Din got up, and Vanth clapped him on the back of his shoulder, the touch feeling electric before they walked out into the cool air. They returned to the celebration with renewed energy in every step.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mando'a  
> Ad'ika - little one  
> Jate ca - good night  
> Osik - shit
> 
>   
> Chat with me!  
> New Sands of Time [discord](https://discord.gg/zEwyCKqrcB)  
> My [Tumblr](https://coffeequill.tumblr.com/)  
> My [Twitter](https://twitter.com/coffee_quill)


	2. Further From Home Than Ever Before

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Din and Vanth take the first steps of their journey.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I finished this pretty quick, but wanted to hold off on updating to keep some semblance of a realistic update schedule. But... fuck it. The anxiety of this election on top of COVID surges has been insane. I've been making my puppy cuddle with me more and y'all get the update. Drink water and eat well, friends.
> 
> Chat with me!  
> New Sands of Time [discord](https://discord.gg/zEwyCKqrcB)  
> My [Tumblr](https://coffeequill.tumblr.com/), where I'm thrilled to hear from you.  
> My [Twitter](https://twitter.com/coffee_quill)

In the morning, Din was quick to ready himself. The rest of the town continued to sleep as the suns rose, the heat thickening, still nestled away in their beds to sleep off their hangovers. Din and the baby seemed to be the only ones awake, and Din fetched his satchel to rest the child in it, letting the baby stay with him without touching the sand.

Din rolled up his bed mat that Vanth had provided and leaned it against the wall, then glanced at the bed to the man himself. 

Vanth was snoring. It wasn’t terribly loud, and Din was sure he snored himself, but it had been enough to make the baby whine and grumble and burrow his way beneath Din to get away from it. The marshal hadn’t exactly been slow in his drinking and Din had watched him empty cup after cup whilst resigning himself to a slow start to travel. Din sat at the table now. The baby sat beside his elbow. They looked at each other.

“Think this will be okay?”

The kid cooed.

“... Wake him up.”

Din stood and lifted the child, walking to the bed where he set him down beside Vanth. The marshal mumbled in his sleep and rolled over onto his front, facing the wall, and the baby made a soft “eh?” before looking up at Din.

“Wake up.”

The baby’s ears twitched, then he crawled forward. With a soft gurgle, he climbed up onto Vanth’s back, sitting between his shoulder blades. Vanth only shifted slightly. Din pulled the chair over with a sharp scrape against the floor and sat again, and the baby looked back at him. He leaned forward and patted his hands against the back of Vanth’s neck.

“Aaa-aah.”

“Nuh’,” Vanth mumbled. His eyes didn’t open.

The baby’s ears twitched again at the noise. “Abaah,” he trilled, and he shifted higher on Vanth’s back. He leaned forward to push against his cheek with one hand, the other patting at his hair, in a motion almost identical to previous wakeups Din had gone through. “Aaah!” he trilled again, but this time a small hand slipped—

The kid tumbled onto Vanth’s face, then to the bed, and Din grimaced.

Vanth pushed himself up with one hand, eyes blinking open with an expression screwed in sleep-riddled confusion. He stared down at the baby through half-lidded eyes, processing the image, before he rubbed at his face, the hand then going through his hair. “... What the hell, kid?”

“Don’t swear at him.”

Vanth turned over to look at Din, then let out a tired breath and slumped onto his back, rubbing at his eyes. Din walked over and leaned over him, scooping up the squirming baby trying to right himself. “Good job,” he murmured, and Vanth stared up at him with furrowed brows.

“Did you  _ sic  _ him on me?”

“Drink some water,” Din said. “If you’re coming. I want to go soon.”

Vanth grumbled, but he leaned his arms back to stretch. The kid reached up to come to Din’s shoulder, planting himself there, and Din cradled him as he took the bag off the chair. “Every wakeup gon’ be like that?”

“You live with a toddler, you live by their schedule.”

Vanth paused, but he nodded with a conceding huff. “Right you are.”

Getting out of bed and stretching was followed by a series of pops and cracks that Din sympathized too well with, even if he were several years younger. Vanth got water, turning on the faucet and just ducking down to sip from the stream, then straightened. “Gotta grab some stuff,” he grumbled.

Din nodded. He placed the kid in the bag and sat in the chair with the bag in his lap to wait. Vanth gave them a glance, then pulled out a sturdy leather pack from beneath the bed. He began to dump his clothes into it, and Din made the mental note that he would need a flight suit. But he was distracted. Vanth had a more rugged look to him now, his hair mussed and stubble thicker. He absentmindedly ran a hand through it as he packed and Din bit his lip.

_ Calm down. _

“Breakfast?”

“Something to go.”

Vanth didn’t grumble, but Din could see that he wanted to.

The marshal changed into clean clothes, then swung his pack up onto his back and they were moving. “Breakfast,” he repeated as they stepped out, waving Din towards the speeders, and Din watched him walk down the path of buildings. Certain that Vanth wasn’t about to skip out on him, Din walked towards the parked speeders and transferred the baby from one bag to another, instead folding up the carrier and packing it on the bike.

He didn’t wait long. Vanth returned with a box and was already eating whatever was in it. “Here,” he said. “Maina just made ‘em. Best part of living here.”

Din looked in the box. It appeared like small, flat cakes, cream-colored and topped with white glaze. He reached in and took one, finding that it was still warm, and lifted his helmet just enough to slip it into his mouth. He bit down and —  _ Manda.  _ It was… fantastic. It was warm and buttery and the glaze was sweet, his mouth immediately  _ salivating,  _ and he found himself taking another before he could swallow the first. Vanth chuckled.

“Good, right? I swear, they’re addicting.”

Din nodded. He took a third, this time for the kid, and handed it to the baby as Vanth ate his own. The baby took the treat and stared at it before taking a bite, and then he eagerly took another until the cake was shoved into his mouth. There were more cakes, but Vanth had the self-discipline to store them on his speeder rather than let them all be devoured at once. He climbed onto his speeder, and Din climbed onto his, starting up the engine.

“Saying goodbye?” he asked.

“Did goodbyes last night,” Vanth said. “They’ll be okay.”

Din nodded. “Just follow, then,” he said.

He hit the pedal and shot off towards the desert. Just behind him, Vanth’s speeder spurred to life and followed, and it quickly pulled up beside Din’s. Din glanced over and Vanth met his gaze; Din looked ahead again. Hopefully, their journey could take the day rather than an extra half like the ride down here had been. Din hadn’t been sure of where he was going. He’d likely been more off track.

He tried to let his shoulders relax.

The suns were nearly set as they arrived at hangar 3-5, and Din brought them straight to Peli’s back door where he had once met with Toro Calican. That memory wasn’t a fond one, and Din tried to ignore it in favor of this better one. “Your ship’s here?” Vanth asked, looking up at the place as Din got off his speeder.

“Mechanic is a friend,” Din said, transferring the baby into his bag carrier. “Trustworthy ones are few and far between.”

“I can imagine.”

Vanth took the armor into his hold while Din hefted up the slab of dragon meat. They walked to the door. Din reached for the button with his knee, then stopped just before pressing it and turned again. “Peli loves the kid,” he said, out of breath with the weight in his arms. “But she can be a bit much.”

Vanth looked at him and shrugged.

Din hit the door button and walked through. The baby began to squirm in the bag at his hip, cooing with recognition, and Din started down the stairs leading into the hangar. He came through the doorway and walked into the ship space where the Razor Crest still sat, surrounded by pit droids. The baby let out a happy squeak this time, eyes searching for Peli, while Din headed straight for the ship’s ramp.

“Oh, they’re ba— hey! Are you going to say  _ hi?” _

The baby squirmed harder in the bag at her voice. “Holding something!” Din hissed before stepping into the cargo hold, resting the meat down on top of a crate. He let out a breath — the chunk was heavier than it looked.

“So he’s not going to— oh. Hello.”

“Howdy, ma’am.”

Din turned and started back down the ramp. Peli had stepped out of her office and was staring now at Vanth, who had taken on a charming smile, one foot set on the Crest’s ramp. Peli’s expression was one of hesitance until she looked towards Din and saw the baby. It shifted to stern, then, and she held out her arms. “Give him.”

Din rolled his eyes but reached down to lift the baby out. The kid cooed and held out his hands to her, happy to be handed over, and Peli grinned as she cradled him. “Did someone have a nice adventure?” she asked. “Did you get to have some fun?”

Din decided not to tell her about the dragon.

“Put that on the floor in the back,” he said to Vanth, gesturing back towards the ship. “I’ll put it away before we go.”

Vanth nodded and started up the ramp, heading into the ship. Din looked back towards Peli and saw that her gaze was following Vanth with squinted eyes before turning the look onto Din. “Is that your Mando,” she said, “or is that armor from a former Mando and this is some  _ special friend?” _

Din stared at her. “... He was the Mandalorian I was told about, but he’s not a true one,” he said. “Special… what?”

_ How? _

“Mm.” Peli didn’t look convinced. She stroked the little one’s ears and gave Din a  _ look  _ as though she completely saw through him, and he swallowed, wondering if she were only making assumptions or he’d somehow given it away already. If  _ Vanth  _ could pick up on it too. “You’re leaving now, then? I want to know if I need to savor the time with this one before you disappear into the stars again.”

“We’ll be back,” Din said. “He’s coming with me to train but has to return to Mos Pelgo.”

“Well, let’s look at your ship.”

Din followed Peli towards the scan machine, stopping when a pit droid scurried past him. Peli grumbled at it but began to turn the machine on for a view of the Razor Crest’s once-over. Din glanced at the ship when Vanth lingered in the cargo hold, taking slow steps as he examined everything. In Peli’s arms, the baby cooed.

In short, nothing needed  _ immediate  _ attention. If Din had given more time, further repairs could be done, but anything that could lead to worse had already been mended. “Thank you,” he said, and gave her the credits.

Peli pocketed the credits and gave a dramatic sigh, looking down at the kid. “I guess this is goodbye again,” she said. “You come back here and tell me if your Daddy ain’t feedin’ you right.”

The baby trilled. Peli gave him another hug, brushing her fingers over his ears, then reluctantly gave him back to Din. The baby snuggled against his cuirass and Din gave her a nod. She returned it, then Din turned on his heel and headed for the Crest. Vanth stood at the top of the ramp, leaning against the doorway with a fond expression before stepping in to let Din by.

“Heading out?”

“Yes.”

Din shut the door and walked to the baby’s pram where it hovered beside the crates. He set the kid down into it, then walked to where he had laid the meat. He would have to cut it up so he could store it. The baby crowded against one side of his pram now, watching with hungry eyes.

“Need help?”

“Sure.”

Din fetched knives for them both, then a roll of waxed paper to wrap each piece in. They stood on either side of the chunk and began to slice through, cutting off slabs of meat at a time, wrapping each piece up in the paper. Behind Din, the baby whimpered.  _ “Aafa,”  _ he called, and Din could hear him smelling the air. Din shushed him. They worked in silence to cut through the chunk and wrap it, and once they were practically done, Din opened his refrigerated door out of the wall and began to place the wrapped pieces neatly inside.

When the door shut, the baby whined.

“Come up.”

Din gathered the child into his arms and headed towards the ladder. He climbed up one-handed, Vanth just beneath him, and the door opened for him to step into the cockpit. Vanth took in a sharp breath as Din sank into the pilot’s seat, spinning around to face the controls. The baby settled into his lap with familiarity and Din began the startup sequence to bring the ship to life.

“Sit.”

Vanth took the command.

The ship rose out of the hangar, lifting vertically until they cleared the building and the landing gear folded in. The system status appeared in the top corner of the nav computer and everything looked like it was holding together. The baby squirmed to hide his face against Din’s abdomen. Small claws dug into the vest beneath. He didn’t enjoy liftoff, was not a fan of the gravitational pull. Din rubbed a hand over his back but had to return it to the controls. The kid whined.

Soon, they broke free of Tatooine’s atmosphere, and shot amongst the stars.

Din leaned back. Once the gravity laid off, the baby relaxed too, and lifted his arms to be snuggled. Din obliged, bringing the kid up to his shoulder where he snuggled in with a soft coo. He began to program in the coordinates for Nevarro when Vanth stood behind him with an even softer “Well, shit.”

Din looked back. Vanth was staring out the transparisteel with a wondrous expression, eyes big, darting around to look at the stars. In the far cosmic distance, there was a nebula, painting beautiful colors across the black expanse. Din watched him before looking out at the stars too, letting it hold his attention for just a few seconds. 

“Never been off Tatooine before,” Vanth breathed. “Just heard folks in Mos Eisley talk about… damn.”

“It’s normal to me.”

“What I’d do for that beauty to be normal.”

_ It can be normal now. _

Din tore his attention away and began to input the coordinates again. He reached for the hyperdrive and pulled it. The stars began to streak past and Vanth sucked in another breath with wide eyes of amazement, almost looking like a kid on Life Day, and Din began to feel a warmth in his chest. A happiness at getting to be the one who showed this to Vanth, even if it was unlikely for anyone else to, but to make the man smile like an awestruck child even after all that he’s seen—

Din smiled, too.

With their course set, Din fired off another command at the computer, sending a message to Cara after finding her new Nevarro reception address.  _ Coming. Kid and friend. Want to meet.  _ Admittedly, he would have  _ some  _ reservations about introducing Vanth and Cara to each other, namely the amount of snark and mischief they could get into to give Din a headache. But Din trusted Cara’s fighting ability and that she could be helpful in training Vanth, specifically in fighting without the armor.

_ The armor. _

It sat in the cargo hold, a flashing question in his mind.

It had clearly seen better days. The paint was so chipped that it was either  _ quite _ long-removed from its previous owner or the owner had gone through some real  _ shit  _ just before it was scavenged by jawas. Either way, Din did not think it likely that the owner was alive any longer to reclaim it — not that they could after losing a helmet. Din’s option looked to be giving it to another Mandalorian who could do something to repurpose it. He would have to take a look and see what he could do to fix the jetpack — he’d punctured a hole in the tank, but he might be able to either mend or replace it.

_ Are you going to just hold onto it when Vanth could use it? _

Din grimaced beneath the helmet. Yes, he could let Vanth continue to wear the armor. He already knew how to fight in it. The previous owner was not getting it back. And if Vanth was serious enough to eventually take the Creed, he would need to have  _ some  _ beskar, at least the helmet.

_ Well? _

Din shoved that thought aside. He did not want to confront it now. Instead, he spun around and got up from his chair, scooping the baby into his arms as he stepped towards the door. “Ship tour,” he said, and Vanth tore his eyes away from the light of hyperspace to follow him down into the cargo hold.

“How long til’ the destination?”

“A few hours. Crest’s always been enough for one person, might get cramped with two.”

Vanth scoffed as his boots hit the ground. “Cramped. Mando, just your  _ cockpit  _ is like the size of my house.”

The cockpit was smaller, at least by a little, Din wanted to say, but he kept his mouth shut. Instead, he gestured towards the vacc tube. “Got that there,” he said. “‘Fresher is further down, by the galley. Laundry box is beside it. Here’s…” he reached for his vambrace and opened the weapons’ closet. “Everyone’s favorite.”

Vanth’s eyes widened. He stepped closer to look at the array of guns, charges, and ammunition with the same wide-eyed look of wonder that Cara had, though with more amazement than Cara’s  _ new favorite toy  _ look. “Damn,” he whispered.

Din grabbed the armor that had been set on the floor and lifted it, placing it down at the foot of the locker. He closed the doors again. “Need to keep the kid out,” he mumbled. “The charges look fun.”

“Sure do.”

Din shook his head as if exasperated, but the fluttering was back.

Cara was waiting for them as they landed. Din was sure Vanth was happy to get off the ship; in the hours of travel between Tatooine and Nevarro, the marshal had been antsy, discontent with  _ only  _ having the ship space to move in even if it was, in fact, bigger than his previous home. Vanth liked to be active and Mos Pelgo had had plenty of outdoor room to move in, with sunshine and fresh air, now replaced by the recycled air and close quarters of the Razor Crest.

Din had been surprised to come down from the cockpit and see that Vanth had slipped on another shirt on top of his last one, and realized that his preference of a cooler environment on the Crest was going to be a bother for not only the baby. Idly, he’d gone back up and turned some of the heat higher.

With the hovering pram following, Din and Vanth walked off the ramp, spotting the former shock trooper with ease where she leaned against Nevarro’s gateway.

“Mando,” she said with a smirk as they approached. “Didn’t take you all that long.” From behind them, the baby cooed excitedly at her and she took on a grin, straightening up. “Hey, bean.”

“Cara, this is Cobb Vanth. He’s marshal of a town from Tatooine.” Din said. He gestured between them, looking back at Vanth. “Cara Dune. Former rebel shock trooper, now marshal of Nevarro.”

“Former rebel, huh.” Vanth grinned and stuck his hand out. “Impressive.”

“Fellow lawman. So you know how it goes.” Cara smiled back and shook it. She stepped back to look at Din with briefly raised eyebrows, questioning him. “... How long are you two staying?”

“Got somewhere we can talk?”

Cara bit her lip, rocking her weight between her heels. “Common house is quiet right now,” she said, “we can grab a corner.”

Din nodded and they followed her into the city. Nevarro had  _ changed.  _ Most of it had been not just rebuilt, but rebuilt better; the buildings were taller, better designed to stand strong, and with color everywhere. There were more  _ people  _ and a group of children ran past, laughing. Din looked around at a city he could barely recognize and began to smile at what had changed. It was… nice.

Behind Cara, Vantha nudged Din with his elbow. “Bounty guild?”

“Hunters.”

“I  _ figured.  _ What are we—“

“We’ll explain.”

Vanth looked at him now with concern, but Din tried to brush it off, just until they reached the common house. The walk was long but they arrived through the side door where Cara scanned a card to let them in. Din eyed the new scanner without comment. The interior of the building was structurally the same, but the decoration had changed to some lighter color, a bit more light than the darkness Din had grown used to.

Karga was not present. Cara led them past the bar to the far corner, side stepping a few hunters who turned to watch. Like she said, the hunters were fewer than average with most likely on assignment already. The stares eventually subsided as they each settled into a booth, Din feeling Cara’s curiosity and Vanth’s uneasiness as he sat with the pram hovering beside the table.

“So you’re coming back with the kid  _ and  _ a Tatooinian marshal,” Cara said. She reached over to give the kid a gentle scratch behind his ear. “... So, uh. What the hell?”

“I was told of someone named Gor Karesh who would know where other Mandalorian coverts are hidden,” Din said, leaning back in his seat. “If I can find other coverts, I can inquire about the child’s kind with less… suspicion raised, and figure out what else the Mandalorians might remember about the jedi. Karesh told me about a Mandalorian on Tatooine. He turned out to be a Mandalorian  _ hunter.  _ He tried to kill me.”

“Wonderful decision,” Cara said.

Din nodded, a smile tugging at his lips. “I went back to Tatooine and found him,” he said, jutting a thumb towards Vanth. “He was wearing armor of another Mandalorian. Got it from jawas and was protecting his town. I needed it back according to code. Deal was to kill the krayt dragon that was terrorizing the town.”

Cara’s eyes widened and she straightened. “A  _ krayt dragon.” _

“The Tuskens helped. Killed the thing.” Din hesitated, then glanced at Vanth. “But he was the town’s only protection and taking the armor left them without anything. He’s a good fighter, just untrained.” He paused again before looking to Cara. “I’m going to train him like a Mandalorian, and I want your help.”

Cara… stared at him. She squinted, expression critical, before glancing at Vanth again and back. The baby cooed. “Training him.”

“Yes.”

“Like a Mandalorian.”

“Yes.”

“Is he  _ becoming  _ one?”

“The Creed is an option on the table, if we get that far.”

“... Alright.” Cara shifted. “Well, I’m not a Mandalorian. What do you want my help with?”

“You’re not Mandalorian but you’re a good fighter,” Din said. “And you know how to fight without a suit of beskar. I’ve… admittedly, I’ve never fought without the armor. I can take hits that you two can’t. I’ll need your point of view. You’re also Karga’s marshal and I think a few low-level jobs in the Guild will help with field experience.”

Cara leaned back against the booth seat, her expression thoughtful. She stretched her arm out on the top of the seat to lounge. “Bail jumpers, then,” she said. “... I have the time to help. I just can’t sacrifice Nevarro for it.”

“Fair,” Din said. “Whatever amount of time you’re willing to give.”

“You’re staying planetside, then?”

Din nodded.

Cara opened her mouth to speak when there was a  _ crash  _ and shouts. Each twisted to look and saw two hunters wrestling on the ground, hissing and spitting, one with hands wrapped around the other’s throat. Other hunters were gathered around, a third looking ready to jump in. “HEY!” Cara shouted, scowling. “That’s the third fucking time this —  _ hey!” _

She was up and out of her seat, storming over, and the other hunters began to disperse while the two wrestlers didn’t seem to notice. Din and Vanth watched, the baby’s eyes transfixed, before Vanth cleared his throat. Din looked at him, the fight quickly fading to background noise.

“Bounty hunters, then.”

“I was one before the kid came along,” Din said. “Cara is still new to it.”

“Were you going to tell me that?”

“It didn’t seem relevant until now,” Din said, his throat beginning to go dry. “I’m sorry. I should have mentioned it sooner. It’s not the cleanest business but it’s something that Mandalorians… we can be well suited for.”

“Jobs for  _ field experience.  _ That’s what our plan is?”

“We can find other methods if you’re uncomfortable with it,” Din said. “But yes. Certain targets tend to be easier than others. We can take beginner pucks and you just act as my shadow to get your feet wet.”

“I’m not here to be a bounty hunter.”

“You’re not.”

Vanth’s jaw was tense but he didn’t quite appear angry with Din either. Stares didn’t typically intimidate Din, though Vanth’s didn’t feel good right now, and he just turned his gaze towards the fight as Cara broke it up. “Cara is good,” he said. “We always come up even with each other. You won’t get better training from anywhere but us two, especially if you want to be a Mandalorian.”

_ “Can  _ I be a Mandalorian?” Vanth said. “Be honest with me if that’s  _ actually  _ on the table. If there’s a real chance you’ll let me say your Creed.”

“There is,” Din said. “I’m not going to dangle something in front of you just to pull it away at the last moment. But I’m serious when I say it’s  _ not  _ a life most people want. At some point, there might be a time when you decide that you like the way you live now and not want to invite more danger into your life by wearing the beskar.”

“Who’s going to care about a Mandalorian in a tiny town on Tatooine? We ain’t even on a map.”

“Vanth,  _ I  _ found you. By word of mouth from a man  _ hunting down  _ Mandalorians to harvest beskar. He knew about you. Others probably heard, too.”

Vanth’s expression shifted and he frowned.

“If they came for you — you would have been able to just take it off and hand it over. Keep your life. But if you’ve taken the Creed...” Din shook his head and looked towards the baby, who watched them both with a solemn expression. “I’ve been ready to  _ die _ rather than give it up. That’s what it takes. I’ve come close to breaking my Creed before, and I have no intention of actually doing so. I’ll take a warrior’s death first.”

Vanth looked at the table.

“You taking the Creed is on the table. But once you say those words and you put that helmet on — that’s it. As long as you are a Mandalorian. So one day you might wake up and realize that you  _ don’t  _ want it. I don’t want you to feel locked in. There is  _ nothing  _ easy about this life.”

The marshal had gone quiet as though mulling over the words. He looked at his hands, then Din, before his eyes settled on the kid. The baby cooed at him, then trilled, leaning forward in his pram like he wanted to climb onto the table. He managed to scamper up, Din’s hands ready to catch, and then he wandered over to Vanth’s side of the table. He held his arms out.

Vanth watched him, his jaw shifting. But after a moment he reached out and lifted the kid, cradling him in his arms, looking down. The baby cooed and smiled, and Vanth offered a finger to be grabbed again. The kid took it and squeezed. Din watched them, sitting still but with his nerves still alert.

Cara returned, then. The two brawling hunters were nowhere to be found and the others had all dispersed to return to their drinks. She settled back into her seat as she looked between them.

“So when are we gettin’ started?” Vanth asked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (No Mando'a)
> 
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	3. Of Nightmares and Bruises

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Din revisits the past. Vanth makes the rough start to Mandalorian training.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Making slow strides! Lovely thanks to [Melo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melo_Mapo) and Panda for beta-reading this chapter because lord it was a mess.
> 
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_ Fighting, sweating, slipping, holding his breath. _

_ It was dark and unbearably hot in the cramped, moving space. He grabbed desperately at the dragon’s tongue but there was no grip and his heart pounded with fear. Din panted. His plan in this was half-baked at  _ best  _ and he shoved his hand and foot out, trying to hold himself away from the wall of teeth that trapped him here, trying to find the trigger on his rifle— _

_ The rifle slipped, and then it was gone. _

_ “No!” _

No, no, no.

_ Fear wracked his body. He tried his jetpack but he flew for less than a second before slamming against front teeth with a choked groan. The dragon was still burrowing. He thrust out his arm with his flame thrower but the beast didn’t stop. He was drenched in bile, and his panic only increased, realizing that escape was impossible without his amban. Something was starting to burn, and when he looked down he saw that his clothes were being eaten away by the acid, his beskar turning color with it. _

No.

_ His hand came to his belt with the detonator. There was one option. He could still kill it. _

_ It ended here, without his kid, and he gave himself no time before he squeezed the button, a warrior’s— _

Din jerked awake.

He hadn’t remembered falling asleep. He pushed himself up from being slouched over the ship controls, his neck and back aching, and found that his body was trembling. He had the unsettling sensation of having been startled awake by a nightmare and for a moment he just sat there, out of breath, staring into the reflection of his helmet in the transparisteel. The sun was setting on Nevarro, and he leaned back to roll his shoulders as sweat dried beneath his armor.

He let out a breath. He must have been out for a few hours.

He got up and headed to the ladder. Below, he heard soft murmuring and stopped for a moment to instead peer down. Vanth and the kid were out of sight, but he could hear them, Vanth’s soft drawl and the kid’s whiney responses. Din climbed down into the hold and turned to look down towards the back ramp where the two were. Vanth’s new bed was a hammock they had bought from the bazaar and rigged up to the Crest’s overhead bars. It would be easy to put up or take down if it were in the way.

Vanth was lying in the hammock, stretched out with one leg over the side to push off the ground and sway slowly. His arms crossed back behind his head and the baby sat on his chest, turned away from Din. Din walked over and Vanth’s eyes glanced towards him as the baby whimpered, reaching out to pat at his face. The kid turned to see Din, only to twist back around and whine at Vanth again.

“Hey — look, Daddy’s here.” Vanth tilted his chin up to pull away from the kid’s hands and nodded towards Din. “He can keep playin’ hide ‘n seek with you. How’s that sound?”

“Nuuuuh!”

“He’s insistent,” Din said.

Vanth sighed and looked at him, bringing the hammock to a stop with his foot. “I gathered that.” The baby whimpered again, thumping his hands against Vanth’s chest to draw his attention back. “What? Now you’re just hitting me. I’m too tired to play with ya anymore.”

The baby slumped back on his rump. “Nuuuh,” he whined again, “nuuuh —  _ uuuuuh—“ _

His face scrunched up and the whine turned high pitch to become a wail. Vanth stopped and furrowed his brows, “Hey. Hey, hey, it’s okay. Kid…”

Din sighed and stepped forward, reaching out to scoop up the baby. “You’re being dramatic,” Din told him. “You can play games with him later.”

“No!” The baby cried out. Din stared down at him, surprised by the new,  _ Basic  _ word that the child had attempted but never spoken. Vanth sat up in the hammock, frowning with a tinge of guilt in his expression as if he was responsible for the tantrum. “No, no!”

“We’re going on a walk,” Din said in a firm voice. Vanth nodded. Din walked forward and off the ship, onto Nevarro’s surface, his boots crunching against the sandy dirt. The baby continued to wail and cry, squirming in Din’s hold, but Din kept him close and began walking towards Nevarro’s gateway. The kid didn’t try to hit Din like he had Vanth, but did finally bury his face into Din’s elbow and let out his muffled wails. Din rubbed his back. He would cry himself out, and it would be cathartic. The baby never stayed upset after he had cried it out.

Din sensed that it had nothing to do with Vanth or the game itself, but the child’s own frustration. He didn’t get much stimulation. Din had few toys for him, aside from his ball from the cockpit or a small stuffed bantha that had seen better days, and most of their time off the ship meant the child was being carried around or left behind. The baby was often quite passive about things, and Din hadn’t paid mind to entertaining the child more. But through whatever link seemed to be between them, however the baby projected his feelings, Din understood that the frustration had built up.

Vanth, Cara, Peli, the pit droids — all presented to the child like new friends to provide that stimulation and fun. Repeatedly, that hope was dashed. He had no friends on the same level of youth as him. “We’ll play later,” Din murmured beneath his breath, and a single ear twitched up towards him. “Promise.”

“Umph,” the baby whimpered, turned to peek up at him.

“We’re going to be here awhile. We’ll figure something out.”

The child’s whines faded, but Din found himself content to continue walking through Nevarro with a sense of almost nostalgia. The Imperials had been burned out, with Cara’s promise that she was keeping an eye out for anything off but had come up with nothing so far. The townspeople here were gruff and hardened, exactly as one would expect on a volcanic planet like Nevarro, a mismatched population of different races that had somehow congregated here.

They came to the bazaar. The stalls were being packed up for the night, goods and wares being folded and stashed and wrapped to be taken away and brought back again. The common house was loud and rowdy, lights bright from inside with laughing and cheering hunters, and the baby turned in his arms to look at the lights. Din watched the windows, then looked towards the door. Cara was likely inside. She’d be willing to come walk with him, had been receptive before to whatever lingered on his mind, and somehow Din knew that if there were one person in the galaxy he could confide in about his feelings towards Vanth—

She would tease him. But in their time together, he’d found she was a realist,  _ had _ to be to be a shock trooper, and her teasing was like that of a big sister he’d never had. Relentless with teasing, but deeply caring. He could already think up the jokes that he’d have to endure before she would stop and really talk to him. Maybe she had a better grasp of these feelings. Maybe she could assure him that this was just a silly crush and maybe even know how to get over it faster.

The baby shifted. Din continued to circle the bazaar, bouncing him. He could find another time to confide in Cara since they were planning to stay and hopefully they could find a way to finish that arm-wrestling match.

His eyes drifted towards a fluttering curtain.

Din froze and watched it rustle in the breeze.

He was well aware of the sewers beneath them. Once, he had walked through Nevarro, and he had been given some sense of comfort that he was not alone here. His people were below, other Mandalorians who would allow his presence and give him protection if he needed it. It was  _ his  _ covert, by technicality more than anything, when he did not stay long and instead brought them resources in exchange for his place among them and for forge access.

The guilt had weighed heavy after Gideon. Last he knew, the Armorer was still melting down beskar with every intention of leaving with it. But it had now been some time and he wasn’t sure how things stood — if she were still here, or where she had gone. The contingency plan had not been told to him. But as long as Din had known her, she had always seemed to have the answer, or always able to set the tribe members down the right path. It had been her words that sent Din back towards the safehouse to save the child.

With a sigh, he began towards the curtain and stepped through it.

He had to reach for his light. The tunnels were not lit as usual when the Mandalorians lived here and it left them in otherwise darkness. The baby whimpered and snuggled closer against Din. Din looked around with the light as he walked forward, shining it where other Mandalorians had once sat to spend their time, and his gut churned. Some of their items had been left behind, sitting on the benches as if they awaited their owners’ return. The troopers had the element of surprise and no one had been prepared.

The Armorer was gone.

Din found no pile of beskar, nor a hot forge. Instead, he walked into the forge room and for the first time, it felt cold and dark, the flames put out and no sound to be heard. He turned his head to search for the tool bench, but it too was empty, everything gone from the tools to the molds. Something inside him deflated; while he had known she would not stay here, it also left him stranded. He had no Mandalorians to contact, he had no one to mend his armor if it lost its integrity, no one to guide his steps. The baby made a sad coo and Din adjusted him, leaning back against the tool bench.

As he leaned, it shook, and there was a  _ smack  _ as something hit the floor. Din turned to look down at it and spotted a small box. He frowned and picked it up with one hand, setting it on the toolbench, and opened it up carefully though he didn’t expect any trap. He shone his light into its contents and squinted when the light reflected back off the shining surface of... beskar. He tilted his light and reached down to pick up a tiny mythosaur amulet, its string tangled with two others. 

Spares. Din knew they were kept for foundlings. They had been intended as a child’s first gift from their tribe, right? His memory on it was fuzzy. He was starting to regret that he had never spent much time here.

Footsteps echoed and he dropped the amulets to look around.

They came closer and closer, and Din tensed with a hand slipping down to his blaster. A light dashed across the floor, shaking with the movement of someone walking with a lamp, and he raised his blaster when a voice called out.

“Din?”

Cara. Din relaxed as quickly as he had tensed up, sliding the blaster back into his holster. “Cara.”

Cara walked into the forge room as she glanced around. She squinted against Din’s helmet light and he dimmed it down, the baby squealing for her from his arms, and she smiled at the kid before looking at Din. “Did you come here for something?” she asked, turning her head and shining the light across the room. “I came out and saw you disappear through the door, got worried.”

“No,” Din said. “I… was just looking.”

Cara looked at him again and shifted with a hesitant expression. “... This marshal guy,” she said. “Do you know what you’re getting into with him? Does  _ he  _ know what he’s getting into?”

Din looked down at the baby and thought over the words. “He can be cocky,” he said. “He wasn’t the most… enjoyable to deal with at first. But he loves the town he protects. They seemed to love him. And he respected the armor.”

“You trust him around the kid,” she said.

He paused. “... The krayt dragon almost killed me,” he said. “If it did, I told him to take care of the child.”

Cara stared at him with a searching gaze. She crossed her arms and her lips pursed, eyes flickering away in thought, before she looked down at the baby who cooed. “Does the kid like him?”

“The kid’s practically adopted him.”

Cara smiled at that and her guard dropped, her stance relaxing. “I’ll take that as a true testament,” she said. The baby squirmed before settling, his eyes shut, and Din knew it was time for bed on the ship. “What about becoming a Mandalorian?”

“What about it?”

“You’re going to train him and he just… leaves? Don’t you guys live in groups for protection, now?” She paused and winced at her own words, eyes glancing around the room. “... Sorry.”

“He has a town to protect,” Din said. “I have to find the kid’s people. He’s willing and he has the spirit. You can’t teach spirit.”

Cara nodded slowly. 

It would be so easy to tell her now, Din thought. Maybe he should, and she could help him work through these feelings that he didn’t know how to handle. He’s had a crush before, sure, but crushes were meant for his child self who had let his attention wander too much, when he was young on Aq Vetina and took an occasional fancy to his peers. In the Fighting Corps, others had caught his eye, but a few too many rejections had sapped his bravery of ever acting on his feelings and now he wasn’t quite sure  _ how  _ to get over crushes. He hadn’t had one in years.

They faded, right?

He would be over it once he disciplined himself against his wandering thoughts.

“How are we doing this, then?” Cara asked. “I do my training and you do yours? He had Mando armor already, why not let him keep wearing it if he intends to swear by the Creed?”

“He might not,” Din said. “I’d rather him be able to fight without it as a failsafe. We start with the basics to build a strong foundation, and… we can figure it out from there.”

Cara sighed. “Alright,” she said. “I’ll start on something for tomorrow. Are you… staying down here?”

“No.”

Din swiped the box of amulets and tucked it into his arms alongside the child, ignoring Cara’s curious gaze, and she didn’t pry. They turned and began to walk towards the door. Din would return later when the light was better and see if there was still anything left to scavenge, though it seemed the Armorer had cleared out. Their footsteps echoed through the tunnels and he felt his stomach turn.  _ Tell her.  _ He needed to tell her. He had to get this off his chest and let another person give him rationality.

But as they walked up the stairs, one after the other, his mouth didn’t open at all.

When Din and the child returned to the ship, Vanth was asleep. He was stretched out in the hammock, sleeping on his side with one arm tucked beneath the pillow. His hair was already mussed and a blanket drawn tight around him. Din watched him for a moment, then walked to the temperature control panel on the wall and turned the environment setting up a few degrees.

He closed up the ship and placed the amulets in a drawer, then walked to the galley and turned on the faucet. The sink was a tiny container that filled up quickly with warm water and the child cooed, eyes blinking with sleepiness. But he hadn’t been bathed properly since before arriving on Tatooine and it was overdue. The baby let him tug off the layers of clothing and set them aside before being eased into the sink, sitting in the warm water, where he stared up at Din and patted his hands in the water.

“Good,” Din murmured when there was no fuss. He grabbed a small rag and got out a container for a tiny spritz of soap to scrub the kid down with. He kept his motions gentle in cleaning up the kid, the water turning murky with dirt and sand, and the baby made a quiet gurgle. His eyes were starting to close. Din scooped water with his hand to rinse off soap and lifted him out with another towel ready to wrap him in. “Happy?”

The kid cooed as he was dried off and Din changed the towel for a blanket, the clothing set aside to be laundered. Din was given a yawn as he picked him up and he smiled to himself, then turned towards the sleeping bunk and opened the door. The baby was compliant as Din placed him in his own hammock, then climbed in himself, shutting the door behind him. He let out a breath at the solitude and took his helmet off to let himself breathe and set it aside to rub at his eyes with the exhaustion of the day hitting him all at once. A soft coo drew his attention back and the baby was staring down at him with half-open eyes, leaning against the side of the hammock.

“It’s been a day,” Din said to the kid, and he yawned. He shifted and laid down as he brushed his hair back from his face, closing his eyes. He rested his head on the pillow and settled, trying to ignore the discomfort of being forced to bend.

The baby made another soft coo. Soon, a whine, and Din was sitting up again to gather up the child with his blanket and let him snuggle down against the pillow too. There was no demand to be cuddled in his shirt, not when it was this warm. Their faces were inches apart, the baby looking up at him with big eyes, and Din resigned himself to being stared at again.

“Go to sleep.”

“Aaabah.”

In a matter of minutes, he was drifting off.

“Shit!”

Din watched from the hill as Vanth was taken to ground again, Cara’s knee at his collarbone and vibroblade hovering just beside his neck. The marshal let out a frustrated huff. They were sparring in the plains beside the lava river, isolated from any watchers in the city, and Din had only arrived a few minutes ago but could sense the frustration of repeatedly losing to Cara. Din began to pick his way down the rocky hill, the child’s pram following him. The sun hadn’t yet reached noon on their first day of training.

“You’re overcommitting,” Cara said, getting off him. She held out a hand and Vanth grabbed it, getting up. “Throwing your whole body behind that punch and you aren’t ready when I dodge and hit back. And still with dropping your guard. You don’t have the armor anymore.”

“I ain’t had to fight like this before,” Vanth grumbled. “I  _ shoot.”  _ As a rock crumbled from Din’s step, they both looked over and Vanth quickly looked away. “... Guards up. Got it.”

“Try these,” Din said.

He stepped down onto the ground and walked over, the pram trailing behind him. He lifted the durasteel vambraces and held them out to Vanth. Vanth looked down at them, then took the vambraces and looked them over before he began to clip them on his forearms. “Thanks.”

“Not beskar, but durasteel can still protect you when you’re blocking,” Din said. “Found those in the bazaar. How are things going?”

“They’re  _ goin’,”  _ Vanth grumbled.

Cara just smirked. “We’re picking out the flaws so we can correct them,” she said. “As  _ frustrating  _ as it might be.”

“It takes time,” Din said.

“It was like this for you?” Vanth asked.

Din shifted his weight. “There were other factors,” he said. He remembered early wakeups and endless drilling. Taking hits from other boys, the punishment when he couldn’t block them, and the strict organization that ceased to matter when the doors closed on their shared bunks. The Fighting Corps had shaped him into a warrior, but there was nothing kind about the process. There was nothing kind about war. And they had made him into a faceless soldier.

“I was a child.”

Vanth stared at him for a moment, then nodded, eyes flickering to the ground. “So you don’t know anything else,” he said.

“Not really.”

“I know how that goes,” Vanth said, his voice quiet.

“Here. Let me see where you’re at.”

Din released the pram’s tether and swapped places with Cara. Cara hooked her fingers on the pram and pulled it with her to sit on the rocks as Din stood across from Vanth. The marshal eyed him, but gave no tells of nerves or hesitation. “Guards,” Din said.

Vanth jolted before his hands came up. Din looked him up and down before he stepped behind him and took hold of his waist, turning him slightly. He grabbed the hand guarding his face and lifted it a little higher. “Make yourself a smaller target,” he said. “Lets you turn more for power in your hits. And that hand needs to be ready to protect your face.”

“You have to worry about that?”

“Beskar helmet helps a lot, but it’s not concussion-proof.”

“He would know,” Cara called.

Vanth chuckled as Din gave her a look. He rolled his eyes and stepped back to face Vanth again, settling into his own ready position with a familiarity that his body could never forget. “Take a swing.”

The marshal watched him, flexing his hands. Din looked back. Vanth’s expression was concentrated before he lunged in and lifted his knee to kick. Din’s front hand dropped to block with his forearm, but Vanth’s knee dropped as well and a fist struck Din across the front of his helmet. Din hissed but recovered quickly, seizing Vanth’s wrist to pull him through. His own knee came up to drive into Vanth’s abs and the marshal almost wheezed as the air was forced out of him.

Vanth drew in a ragged breath, then bent his knees and rammed his shoulder against Din. The shove was strong enough to force Din back and he stumbled backwards before a hand flew to his jetpack controls. He didn’t press in time and landed on his back with a ground, wincing at the dig of the jetpack and the whiplash. Vanth scrambled to get on top of him, one knee on Din’s hip and his other boot pinning his hand. A hand shoved down at Din’s shoulder.

“Got—”

Din grunted and brought his knee back, bracing against the ground to shove Vanth off and to the side.  _ Just sparring,  _ he reminded himself. Vanth tumbled onto his back beside him with a groan and began to get up, but Din was quicker and tackled him back to the ground. He straddled Vanth’s waist and seized his wrists to pin above his head, and his hand reached back to his boot to pull his vibroblade. It hummed at Vanth’s throat and the marshal froze beneath him, ceasing his struggle against Din’s grip in an instant.

“Yield,” he said quietly, out of breath and red-faced. “I yield.”

Din climbed off him. He held out his hand and Vanth pulled himself up, both out of breath. “That was good,” Din said. “That was scrappy.”

Vanth’s eyes darted to Cara. “That’s the only way I know how to fight,” he said, with a breathless grin. He glanced at Din and it faded as he cradled his hand. “... Taught myself guns, more. Fighting wasn’t allowed.”

Din frowned. “... Allowed.”

“Another round?”

Cara gave Din an uncertain glance and beneath the helmet, he felt the same, but the redirect said enough. Cara looked back to Vanth and nodded. “Try to stay on your feet, huh?” she teased, and Vanth chuckled.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Din began to feel unsettled. He turned and walked back to the hill as Cara took his place and sat down on a large flat rock, the pram hovering beside him. The baby cooed up at him, then lifted his arms, and Din picked up the little one to settle him on the ground. The beskar amulet hung from his neck, spilling out from his robes; Din had shortened the string to a more reasonable length. The baby babbled away, putting a hand against Din’s boot before he began to toddle towards small rocks. He reached down for them and Din leaned forward with his elbows on his knees to watch.

_ Allowed. _

Din had a feeling of what that meant, and it made his stomach twist. He began to think of Vanth’s protectiveness over his town, what he’d turned down from Jawas to take Mandalorian armor.

Vanth began to match Cara. She could still get him down in a pin when she decided to, but with each attempt, he was holding out a little longer and able to hold himself a little better. It wasn’t much in the way of progress, not yet, but muscle memory came with time. Vanth starting to keep his guard up was enough for today. As the baby sat and played with the stones, tapping them together, Din watched.

It felt like another hour before Cara was starting to slow and Vanth was exhausted, any hope of keeping his guards up starting to drop. “Good,” Cara breathed, “nice job.”

“Thanks.” Vanth cradled his hand again and winced. He flexed his fingers out and Din walked over to see the nasty bruising across his knuckles. Internally, he winced with sympathy. “... Helmet got me good. Shit.”

“Need to ice that,” Din said, and Vanth looked over at him. He nodded. “We can start on recovery work. You’ll be sore and only get more sore later.”

“Ice helps?”

“Tremendously.” Cara chuckled. “You’re not on Tatooine anymore. We can get some from the common house’s kitchen.”

Vanth gave a slight smile at that but did hold himself more carefully. While neither Din nor Cara had gone hard, their focus more on teaching than toughening, Din was sure he was already littered with bruises. Din walked back towards the baby, who still sat playing with his rocks, and blinked at Din before being scooped up. He cooed happily and squealed when his gaze turned onto Vanth. The child reached his arms out towards the marshal, then his expression dropped to a frown and he reached harder when Din didn’t give him over.

“Hey, lil’ guy,” Vanth said with a grin, still cradling his hand. The baby whimpered and squirmed. “I’m all good.”

“He’s okay,” Din said, adjusting the kid in his arms to keep him away. He walked over and placed the baby into his pram, re-coding the tether. The baby sniffled but Din just glanced towards Cara, who looked back with the same hesitation. “Everything’s fine.”

The kid looked confused, but he soon settled down in the pram, grabbing onto his blanket. They began to walk around to the front of the city. Cara gave Din a slight elbow and Din looked up to meet her searching gaze.

“Are you going to tell him about the powers?” she asked beneath her breath.

Din shook his head. He hesitated. “... Let’s get settled first,” he said, and Cara’s brows furrowed but she nodded.

Beside them, the baby was cooing at Vanth, and the marshal had that enchanted look again, with the half-smile that graced his features so well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies to anyone who read "The Fallen Sail Fair" because uh, I wrote the dream sequence and then that was my inspiration for that fic. Whoops.
> 
> The feedback is so, so appreciated <3
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	4. The Important Hurdle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Training continues. Din makes a decision for their group.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter.
> 
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The new dawn brought a new day.

Vanth’s training made a slow but steady progress when it came to hand-to-hand combat. They ran him through combination drills relentlessly He left Din and Cara with bruises of their own, blotchy yellow spots on their arms that Din was more than happy to take.

“You’re improving,” Din said.

Vanth didn’t respond, still holding out a stretch with his eyes shut. After his shower from the day, he wore pants and an undershirt with no sleeves; it showed off a slender but muscular form, littered with colored bruises. Alongside a myriad of faded scars that could rival Din’s own. He held his breath and Din sat back out of his own stretch to watch him as the baby wandered over. Vanth let the breath out and pushed himself up with wrapped hands, heading for the waiting bag of ice sitting on the galley counter, and grabbed it. “Improvement hurts.”

“No one said it would be fun.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

The baby cooed at Din, holding up his bantha toy in a presentation. Din looked down at him. “I see it,” he said. The baby frowned up at him, eyes barely peering over the toy, and then held it up higher. “What?”

“Aaah!”

Din took the toy into his hands. The baby backed up a few feet, looking up at Din with big eyes, and Din sighed before glancing towards Vanth. The marshal’s back was turned as he taped on the ice pack to his bicep and Din looked back to the kid, tossing the toy towards him. It was caught in the air, then tossed back, and the baby giggled. Din caught it and tossed it a second time, but as he caught it again Vanth looked over. He held the toy in his lap and the baby whimpered, holding his hands up.

“Abaa!”

Vanth looked back to the ice and Din relaxed. “Hey,” he murmured, and he held the bantha out to the kid. “Go show him this, huh? He’ll like it.”

The baby frowned up at him, but he took the toy and looked towards Vanth. He made a small whine, looking at Din again before he started towards the marshal at a slow waddle, ears back. Vanth tore off the end of the tape with a tired expression on his face and the kid stopped by his feet to look up. He made another whine, now looking up for Vanth.

The marshal looked down. The kid lifted up the bantha with a small squeak and Vanth’s expression softened as he smoothed over the tape. “Whatcha got there?” he asked, crouching down, and the baby cooed again. He reached out to take the toy and sat with his legs crossed as he looked it over. “... Y’know, looks pretty accurate.”

The baby’s ears popped up and he cooed, walking over to climb into Vanth’s lap. Vanth pulled him to sit, arms around him, then turned the toy in his hands. The ice bag crinkled on his arm. “Think this guy’s seen battle, huh?” he asked, pinching the end of the bantha’s right horn that had lost its end, haphazardly sewn up by Din. He turned it again and ran his thumb over the patchy fur and more sewn holes, the slight lumpiness of the stuffing being pushed back inside, and avoiding where it was wet from the kid deciding to chew. “Tough little guy. He’s really from Tatooine.”

The kid babbled, reaching for the toy, and he looked up at Vanth. Vanth raised his eyebrows and smiled, “What’s that?”

The baby stood up in his lap and reached now to grab at the edge of his bandana. He let out a series of noises, other hand reaching to grab onto the toy, and Din leaned back against the wall as he watched. He bit his lower lip, unable to pull his eyes away from the domestic scene in front of him, and there was something incredibly  _ charming  _ about how a rough and tough sheriff from Tatooine covered in those scars would give such attention to a baby.  _ Din’s  _ baby, too, he thought to himself. It wasn’t lost on him that the same could be said about himself. Most people just stared at the kid when they didn’t recognize the species or thought him odd.

Vanth didn’t find the kid annoying. The kid loved Vanth and wanted his attention. Somehow, it seemed they had cleared the most important hurdle with no problems at all.

The kid came first no matter how he felt about Vanth. 

He soon got up to start on dinner, this time a change from dragon meat  _ or  _ rations, and he fetched a frozen dish he had gotten earlier in the day from the bazaar. He slipped it into the cooker and set the time before turning around again, and Vanth was lying on the floor now with the kid on his belly. He propped himself up on one elbow while the other hand was gripping the bantha to manipulate and make it turn as though it were alive. The baby giggled and Din watched as he leaned against the wall, the kid reaching out to grab at the toy. Vanth was grinning.

“He got a name?” Vanth looked up at him.

“No,” Din said.

“Need something to call you by.” Vanth leaned his cheek into his hand. The baby dove forward onto the bantha in a tackle and Vanth chuckled, but the kid started to chew on the damaged horn. “No, no — hey. You playin’ predator now?”

He gently shook the kid off. The baby pouted but didn’t cry. Din shifted his stance and walked over, sitting down nearby, and settled back on his hands. “You’re good with children,” he said. “You said you had a niece.”

Vanth glanced at him and some of the humor faded from his eyes, smile slipping away. “Haven’t seen her or her mama,” he said. He held the bantha out to the kid again but the baby stared at him now with lowered ears and a confused look. Din wondered if he was picking up on emotions Din couldn’t. “Disappeared. Then, the chaos of the Empire, and…”

Din nodded.

“She was three.” Vanth looked back at the kid. “Real… real sweet girl. Looked just like my sister. Might be… thirteen now. Or fourteen. I haven’t kept track.”

“What happened?”

Vanth’s jaw tightened. “I couldn’t do anything,” he said, just loud enough to hear.

The baby stared at him before walking over. He sat down just inside Vanth’s elbow, sheltered by his body, and snuggled in there whilst one hand grabbed onto his bandana. Vanth looked down at him and managed the smallest of smiles while Din watched. The kid babbled some more, then leaned his head into Vanth’s chest and closed his eyes, hand dropping.

“He’s a good kid,” Vanth said.

“You’re a good man,” Din said.

Vanth looked up at him with a surprised expression that softened, turning his gaze down to the kid again.

“Protecting your people isn’t easy on a planet like Tatooine.”

“Bein’ a Mandalorian and takin’ care of this one can’t be easy, either. At the end of it, it’s not really… a choice.”

They looked at each other. Din was sure they both came from battered pasts, from tragedies that no person deserved, and he wondered what twist of fate had allowed for two people from very different places to end up on this ship together, bonding over a child who would have seemed too mystical to be real.

“I’m more than willin’ to do all this if it means I can protect them better,” Vanth said. “People have come in and tried to take our freedom. I  _ ain’t  _ giving up mine, like you won’t give up that armor.”

Din nodded and the room felt somber.

The cooker let out a ring and Din turned to take it out. The tray was steaming and he grabbed a spoon to mix it up before dividing it up between two trays. It was a basic stew of meat and vegetables with spiced broth but a change to their palates from their previous meals. When Din walked over with the tray, Vanth moved from a prone position to sitting. He took the tray and spoon with a hungry expression, rousing a sleepy child’s sense of smell.

“Aaaaama,” the child cooed, and he began to climb up into Vanth’s lap again, eyes fixed on the dish.

“No. Kid. Let him eat.”

“He’s fine,” Vanth said. “We can share.”

The portions were a decent size, but Din shifted his weight. “Don’t give up any for him if you’re hungry,” he said. “He can have something else.”

“Sure,” Vanth said, with an expression that suggested he was going to do quite the opposite. The baby leaned closer to sniff when his amulet slipped out from his robes and swung from his neck. Vanth looked down at it before reaching out to take hold of the beskar. “What’s this?”

“Mythosaur skull,” Din said. “My tribe wears them.”

Vanth had a thoughtful expression.

Din grabbed his spoon and headed for the ladder, careful in climbing up with one hand. He stepped into the cockpit and shut the door behind him before settling in his chair. He slipped his helmet off.

The fluttering in his stomach was almost too much.

He ate quickly, his hunger soon replaced with the ache of a full stomach, and he slipped his helmet on before he got up. Down below, he could hear the soft cooing of the child, and he paused a moment but they were beyond sight. Instead, he stepped forward into the second room of the upper level, a small space with a proper bed he hadn’t used since taking the child as a charge, and crouched down to press on a space beneath it. A section of the floor rose up, a hidden compartment that wasn’t big. Inside were all the pouches of credits he kept stowed away, some meant for spending, and others kept for true emergencies.

_ Food. Shelter. Ship repairs. If the child became sick. _

He drew in a breath as he realized how few credits were actually in his emergency funds.

He dumped it onto the floor to count but found that yes, their money was uncomfortably low. He’d survived off the bare minimum before and knew how to forgo food, knew how to limit his consumption of resources to the level of functional so he could stretch it out, but he didn’t want to force that style of living on Vanth and the child as a result of his own spending. At least this dinner had been nice.

He needed work.

He thought of the pucks sitting now at the common house and sighed.

Down below, Vanth had already cleaned up, and when Din got off the ladder he was lying in his hammock with the child sprawled on his chest. They were swinging slowly back and forth, and by the baby’s stillness, Din could see he was falling asleep. As Vanth saw Din, he brought a finger to his lips in a hush and Din remained quiet as he walked over with soft footsteps. The baby let out a mumble but laid still.

“I got ‘im,” Vanth said.

“You’re okay with that?”

“He’s fine.”

Din looked down at the baby and then Vanth. He nodded. In that case, he could sleep in his own bed, and he walked back towards the ladder. The potential money problems were something to discuss in the morning, and not after they had a good conversation tonight.

His curiosity about Vanth only grew more and more, and he grew increasingly certain that he had judged his character right.

“You want to hunt again?”

Cara had an amused expression on her face, arms crossed as she looked at Din. Din nodded with a look thrown towards Vanth who watched them both. They stood by the lava river again, and the kid slumbered away in his pram, dead to the world after a filling breakfast.

“I need credits,” Din said. “Whatever you’ve got.”

“I can think of a few new ones that could be on your level,” Cara said. She jutted her thumb towards Vanth. “He going with you?”

Din looked at Vanth. “You and the child can stay here,” he said. “I’m used to hunting alone and it’s better that you don’t lose time on training with her.”

“You sayin’ I ain’t worth bringing along?”

Vanth grinned at him and Din rolled his eyes. “Eventually,” he said. “I need the credits more right now. We’ll get you up to that level.”

Vanth nodded.

With the promise of future pucks, Cara turned and headed back towards the city walls to return to the Guild while Din and Vanth began to stretch. The baby remained asleep. Both leaned hard into each stretch, Vanth copying Din’s movements, letting tight muscles loosen up. Din knew the marshal was starting to really feel their daily training while Din was… well,  _ always  _ trying to figure out how to hold his body together a little longer.

“I like her,” Vanth said.

Din looked up and eased back to sit on one heel, his other leg outstretched. “Cara?”

“Offworlders on Tatooine — always trouble. Imperials, Red Key, bastards start to make you wary of what’s beyond our binary star.” Vanth smiled. “Been the opposite so far.”

“Don’t get your hopes up,” Din said. “There’s good and bad in the galaxy. The good will get cut in half again when you put the armor on.”

“Note taken.”

They gave themselves a few more minutes before they were up. They stood across from each other and Vanth lifted his guards, this time in the correct position Din had given him. “Stay on your toes,” Din said, and Vanth’s weight shifted towards his front. “Ready to spring. Good.”

Vanth took a few steps to circle Din, lowering his guards just slightly, enough to open himself up in the front. Din watched him with careful eyes but Vanth’s eyes were darting all over him as if not sure where to strike. His hands flexed but his guards didn’t raise and Din licked his lips before he lunged in with a punch. He swung fast but slowed his fist, no intention of knocking out a tooth—

Vanth threw up his vambrace to block it and ducked in, grabbing Din’s shoulder to slam his knee into his gut just beneath his cuirass. His padding softened the blow but Din hissed in pain. Vanth still gripped him and side-stepped behind Din, shoving him backwards, and Din was falling—

His hands shot out and he grabbed two handfuls of Vanth’s shirt, taking him down with a loud curse. He landed on his back but forced them over and straddled Vanth, only to get an elbow across his helmet and then hands at his throat. Din grabbed at Vanth’s wrists and hissed as a knee slammed up into his back. He sat back on Vanth’s hips and twisted his wrists to force them to the ground on either side of his head, and Vanth squirmed against it with a huff.

“Yield,” Din said.

Vanth looked at him, red-faced and panting. For a moment, they only looked at each other.

Din didn’t feel him move until he’d braced his feet and shoved his hips up in a bridge, pitching Din forward. Din sucked in a breath and instinctively reached out with his hands to catch himself, then felt Vanth grab tight around his chest. He pinned Din’s arm in with his own and forced them over in a roll, and was quick to climb up and be the one mounting. Din grabbed at Vanth’s shoulder and back of his thigh but heard a hum. He looked down to see Vanth had swiped his vibroblade from his boot and held it at his throat.

“Yield.”

Din took deep breaths. “Has Cara started with grappling already?”

“Learned a few things about it.”

“I’m impressed.”

“You yield or not?”

“I yield.”

Vanth got off of him and Din took his outstretched hand to get back up. “You’re faster,” he said. Vanth held out the knife and Din took it, bending down to slip it back into its sheath. “Speed keeps you alive.”

“When do I get to put the armor back on?” Vanth put his hands on his hips. “I know, your plan is to teach me to fight without the metal. But one day…”

“When you can hold your own,” Din said. He couldn’t deny that he wanted Vanth to have the armor. While it clearly wasn’t fashioned for someone of his height, there was… something  _ alluring  _ when Vanth wore it and Din already began to miss seeing it on the man. “Another round. Let’s see the other tricks you have, now.”

Vanth grumbled, but he nodded.

They reset and went at each other again. Vanth  _ was  _ getting stronger and Din felt it when Vanth twisted out of his grip or retaliated with a strike that  _ hurt.  _ Din eased off some of his own mercy, then, and struck harder too. They weren’t being gentle, unafraid to leave bruises, and Vanth seemed willing to take them if he could land a solid knee into Din for it.

The sun moved across the sky and they paused for water between rounds, backs to each other.

Their energy began to dwindle and they were on their last round. “Keep your guards up,” Din warned as they circled each other. “No matter how tired.”

Vanth was dripping sweat and wiped it away with his sleeve before bringing his hands up a little higher.

The marshal’s scrappiness was improving, the technique starting to come together, even if his hits now were losing strength. So were Din’s. They were quick to wrestle to the ground, even if with some slowness, and Din let out a hiss when Vanth’s knee landed on his stomach.  _ “Dammit—” _

“Aaasabah!”

The kid’s burst of babbling was lost on them. Vanth brought his fist back and Din grabbed his arm, hooking his foot behind Vanth’s calf, but Vanth loosened his base just in time for his twist to not work. “Shit,” Din hissed while Vanth scrambled to get in a better mount and he grabbed the marshal’s arms again. “You—”

Vanth grinned, even as he was out of breath. He shoved forward, pinning his forearms to the ground on either side of Din’s head with hands trapped beneath. Vanth’s panting breaths brushed against the skin beneath his helmet and Din’s hands flexed to push back, escape the hold that wasn’t much of a hold right now, but he… froze.

“Yield.”

Din didn’t respond, swallowing. His heart was beating in his ears and in his chest with  _ too  _ much awareness of where Vanth was.  _ Just sparring.  _ They were  _ training  _ and he was going to just let his thoughts turn where they shouldn’t, somehow overwhelmed by just this proximity as if he weren’t a trained warrior—

“Mando? — Hey, kid.”

Vanth had pushed up to hold Din’s wrists, his attention now turned up. Din heard soft whimpers and turned his head up to look. From an upside down view, he saw the baby walking over, teary-eyed and ears drooped. He walked to Din’s shoulder and under Vanth’s arm where he started trying to climb onto Din’s chest.

Vanth released him. “What is it?” Din asked, scooping the child up onto his cuirass. Vanth sat back on him, seeming entirely too comfortable in his position, and the child sniffled before sitting on Din’s chest. He made a whine.

_ Unsettled. Nervous. _

_ Nightmare. _

“Bad dream?”

The baby cooed before looking down, snuggling his face into his collar. 

Vanth got off him and Din sat up, wrapping his arms around the child. He rested the baby at his shoulder, rubbing his back, and Vanth knelt nearby to watch. “You’re alright,” Din murmured, his senses cooling down. The baby’s emotions began to ebb away into  _ comfort  _ and  _ safety.  _ Din stroked his ears for good measure and the kid trilled, snuggling closer against his neck.

“How’s this bounty huntin’ trip going to work out?”

Din looked towards Vanth. “I’ll get a puck or two from Cara,” he said. “Maybe three if they’re close enough. I’ll try to make it within a week, give or take.”

“A week? That long?”

“A week is a safe bet to shoot for. It depends on the targets and the locations. A place like Coruscant for a hunt — that would be a nightmare.” He began to get up and walked towards the pram. Vanth’s footsteps followed. “You can take your things and stay with Cara.”

“That sounds alright.” As Din placed the kid back into the pram, Vanth stood on the other side and reached down to brush his fingers against the kid’s shoulder. The baby looked up at him. “We’ll get to have fun  _ without  _ your dad, huh?”

Din rolled his eyes and re-tethered the pram as he started to walk up the rocks. Vanth climbed up beside him and Din shifted his focus onto getting up the hill. The rocks began large at the bottom, smaller towards the top, some big enough that they had to use their hands to pick their way up.

“Shit—”

Vanth’s foot slipped, sending rocks crumbling down. He caught himself, but Din threw a hand out to grab his wrist. Vanth took a breath with a laugh and accepted the help to pull himself up. “Careful,” Din muttered.

“Always. Used to climb the canyons.”

“Doesn’t look like it.”

Vanth let out an amused breath. “Yeah, yeah. Got used to that jetpack.”

“We’ll start on that when I get back. The jetpack. Proper form.”

Din continued to move up the hill without looking back to see Vanth’s satisfied expression, instead focused on keeping his footing. They made it up the rest of the way without any further slips and headed in towards the city.

The common house was loud as they approached. From the windows he could see shadows of people inside and raised voices, not in shouting but to be heard, drawing a grumble from Din. He reached out and closed the pram, hiding the baby from sight, before heading for the door. Vanth followed just behind him. “Stay close,” Din said, and opened the door. “They’re rough.”

The hunters inside made a thick crowd. They turned to look as Din entered and they moved out of the way for the two to pass, heading deeper within as Din looked around. It took him a moment to find Cara at the bar, sipping spotchka, but her eyes darted over and she smiled at the sight of them—

“Mando!”

Din stopped and his shoulders slumped as he looked towards Greef Karga.

The man was sitting at his usual spot among the booths as though nothing had changed, and for a moment Din had the unforgettable memory of sitting across from the Client with the pram, desperately hoping their plan would work out. Now, he walked over with reluctance and waved Vanth to sit first, following just after. Karga raised his eyebrows as he looked Vanth over. Din reached to open the pram, the baby cooing as he looked around.

Karga laughed. “There he is!” he said, sitting up with a grin. “Little bugger almost looks bigger now. I assume you haven’t been successful yet?”

“No,” Din said. “I’m on a break for other matters. I need jobs.”

“Hm. Dune mentioned.” Karga leaned back, but his eyes flickered towards Vanth. “Aren’t you going to introduce your friend before we get to business?”

Din hesitated. “This is—”

Vanth cleared his throat and leaned back against the seat with his now-signature smirk on his face. “Cobb Vanth,” he said, his voice suave and confident. “His partner.”

_ “Partner,”  _ Karga repeated, and his eyes darted to Din. “Well, congratu—”

“Not like that,” Din snapped. Vanth’s face reddened and he drew in a breath, eyes darting away before deciding to not speak further. “Cara said she could think of a few pucks for me.”

“Yes, yes. Here.”

Karga reached to grab and lay out the pucks. There were three, each turned on to display the target’s image and text reading out their bounties. “This one is a bail-jumper, but good at hiding,” he said, gesturing to the first one. “He’s been slipping through the hands of a few good ones. This one here — a runaway. Then, someone trying to flee their debt.”

Din’s eyes drifted between the three as the baby cooed. Vanth’s brows furrowed as he watched with interest written on his face.

“They’re not quite to your usual level, I know. But things have been a bit slower on the restart and these three have been put out by some angry clients who are willing to pay more than these offenses typically warrant. They’re best of the lot right now.”

“I’ll take them,” Din said, and he reached out to turn off each puck. He stacked them together and Karga produced the fobs. Din clipped each fob to his belt and began to get up again with Vanth by his side. The baby cooed at them, but Din’s eyes were up and searching for Cara, and he crossed over towards the bar with the pram just behind him.

Cara turned. She saw him, then glanced down at the pucks in his hand, before gesturing towards the door. Together they turned and made their way past the hunters to the outside, where they stepped out into the sunlight and open air. The pram followed them out, Vanth just behind it, looking between them.

“When are you going?”

“Now,” Din said. “Sooner, the better. Can you give them lodging?”

Cara looked towards Vanth and the child, crossing her arms, and nodded. “I’ve got room for another body,” she said. “Just don’t take forever. I’m not the adopting type.”

Din met Vanth’s gaze. “We’ll move your things off the ship,” he said. He looked down towards the child. “And you’re going to  _ behave.” _

The kid cooed.

“Of course he will,” Cara said as she looked at the baby with a smile. “We’ll have a fun time without Dad, huh?”

“Aah?”

“That’s right.”

The kid turned his gaze towards Vanth and cooed, reaching his arms up. Vanth picked him up to let him rest in one arm and the moment stood still as Din watched. It passed and Din pulled his gaze away. “Let’s go,” he said.

As the Crest pulled away into the sky, the baby whined. He watched the ship become smaller and smaller, then turned his gaze up towards Vanth. Vanth stood beside the pram with his bag on his shoulder and folded up hammock in his arms, and he looked down at the child to give him a smile.

“C’mon, buddy,” he said. “He’ll be back soon.”

The child looked towards the sky before he began to babble again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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> The enthusiasm you all have for this story has been amazing and it's been really, really motivating. Love you all. <3


	5. Sand to Dust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cobb stays behind as Din hunts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tags updated for violence and injury. No gross detail, but there's a one-sided fight.
> 
>   
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He’d traded golden sand for grey dust.

On Tatooine, the sand got into your clothes, your hair, beneath your fingernails. It sat in your boots and followed you through every square inch of life, drying your throat and rubbing skin raw. Tatooine was home only to those who have been born there — outsiders were too clean, too beaten down by the heat. As a child in Mos Espa, Cobb had sat with his friends and watched people walk past, picking out who the off-worlders were.

Always the ones who tried so hard to keep the sand off their pretty clothes.

Now was the first time in his life that he’d ever been clean of sand.

Cara’s tackle sent him crashing into the dirt with a groan. He recovered from the impact and threw his forearms up to block a punch aimed for his face, sucking in a breath. As Cara drew her arm back again, he sat up fast and grabbed her wrist, throwing his own strike that slammed against her jaw. Cara hissed and caught herself backwards. Cobb shoved her off and slipped out, getting back to his feet.

She got up, too. She put a hand against her jaw, moving it back and forth before resettling into a ready position. “Good hit,” she said. Cobb grinned.

The dust was beneath his fingernails now. It got in his hair and beneath his clothes. Nevarro was nothing like the heat of Tatooine, but it was a good warmth, nowhere near the Razor Crest’s near freeze. Mando had turned up the heat for him, and Cobb had felt some pangs of guilt for it.

A swinging punch brought him out of his thoughts and he ducked beneath Cara’s arm only to get a hard kick against his side. He winced but managed to side-step the next punch and threw back his own. Cara dodged and grabbed his arm, driving her knee into his stomach.

_ “Shit,”  _ he hissed, gritting his teeth.

“Come  _ on—“ _

She wasn’t shy in pushing him. Shooting was his strength, but Cara and Mando both demanded  _ more.  _ He had rarely ached like this — it was all over, his body still trying to adjust to the new training regime, a desperate hope that the adjustment would come soon. But it was a relief at the same time that neither were going easy on him. They wanted more because he could give it.

He was going to meet their expectations.

Their match ended in another pin, but Cara was grinning as she got off him. She stuck her hand down to him and for a moment he only laid in the dirt, catching his breath. “C’mon, old man,” she teased, and he huffed. “That was your best round yet.”

“Sure didn’t feel like it.” He grabbed her hand and pulled, getting up to his feet. Both dusted themselves off and began to stretch.

“You’ve been getting better,” Cara said, her voice firmer now. “Seriously. It’s no miracle, but I can see that you’re taking the corrections. It’s going to take time to turn you from just a gunslinger to something like a Mandalorian, but — I’m impressed at what you’ve already done.”

Cobb looked at her. He smiled. “Thanks,” he said.

It was true. He wasn’t much of a rounded fighter, more reliant on good aim and a quick draw. He’d been almost certain that no, he really wasn’t going to walk out of the cantina with the armor if he’d gone into a shootout with Mando. He might not have walked out at all. But he’d learned to fight how he had to.

“Mando still ain’t back,” he said.

Cara looked up from her lunge stretch. “I’m sure he’s fine,” she said, turning her gaze back down. “Multiple targets, travel time, making stops. He’ll be back any day.”

It had been a week since the Mandalorian left to hunt down his targets, and Cobb tried to remind himself that the estimate of a week had been  _ only  _ an estimate. For a moment, he pursed his lips and sank down onto spread knees, sitting back. He winced at the stretch. Alright. Maybe he  _ was  _ getting a little old.

“Kid’s probably still asleep,” Cara said. “Could get drinks before we head back.”

“Please,” Cobb said with an airy laugh.

They straightened up and started back towards the city. They walked side by side in silence and neither spoke to break it, instead looking around at the blue sky and quiet plains. Cobb breathed in the warm air, the scent of sulfur and ash, something so completely new that he felt like he could never get enough of it in his lungs. Something about it made him feel like a giddy child, as if he were a quarter of his age again, something about finally getting off Tatooine to see more—

This was the fantasy. The pipe dream of a stargazing child whose feet had been chained to the ground.

He had once thought that he could be content with where he was. His childhood, teenage years, adult life, were all scarred and smudged with hardship, with memories that he wished he could get out of his head and out of his dreams. But when he’d come across the armor, it hadn’t been just a lucky find. It had been freedom, a second chance, the key to something new. Something  _ better.  _ Protecting the town from the miners, Red Key, raiders — it had given him a purpose that he would never have expected to get from Tatooine.

Now, he stood on a completely different planet than that of the tiny, dark hovel where he’d been born and raised. Different than where he had lost his mother and the father he’d never known, then his sister and niece, forced to watch them be torn away forever.

“Must be different, bein’ marshal of a place like this,” he said. “Massive, with so many people. I can get up on a roof and see  _ all  _ of Mos Pelgo. Everyone knows everyone.”

“It’s a lot on its own,” Cara said with a smile. “But it’s… good. It feels like…”

“Purpose.”

“Exactly.” Cara looked over. “How did you end up in that spot? I’ve never even heard of Mos Pelgo.”

“We used to be bigger,” Cobb said. “Something worth putting on a map. But after everything that happened — we’re a tiny settlement you’d think no one would bother with.”

“You’d  _ think.” _

A smile pulled at his lips. “Jabba died during the war,” he said. “Left that slab of a throne empty. Threw all of Tatooine out of balance — the Hutts were fighting each other over who would fill it. Then, the Empire fell. There was suddenly no government at all. Massive power vacuum for anyone with the brawn to fill.”

Cara looked at him.

“The same night we heard about the second Death Star exploding, the Mining Collective stormed in to take control,” he continued. “Turned Mos Pelgo into a slave camp, just when we thought we were finally free of it all. I escaped and grabbed a camtono of silicax crystals on my way out. Jawas found me, the crystals bought me the armor, and I came back to run the Collective off.” He paused. “It was satisfying. But not the end of it. Tatooine’s resources are too good for some to pass up.”

“Resources,” Cara said. “Tatooine is a desert wasteland. If they want silicax crystals, sure — but why Mos Pelgo?”

“Silicax oxalate, dilarium oil — they’re valuable. Gems of Tatooine. But so are slaves.”

Cara drew in a breath.

“Tatooine’s got  _ generations  _ worth of slave bloodlines,” Cobb said. “Those lines go far back. Slaves were an entire social class. The Empire pretended to be anti-slavery but it wasn’t like they didn’t want the Hutts on their side.” He kicked a rock and sent it flying. “All that chaos, the slaves found freedom. But the Mining Collective wasn’t the only group. All sorts of syndicates started trying to use the chaos to look legit.”

“You defended the town from them,” Cara said.

Cobb nodded. “Red Key… bastards came after the Collective. Tried gaining a foothold when they wanted the crystals and oil and slave labor.” He made fists at his sides, then brought one hand to the back of his neck, rubbing at the skin beneath his bandana. “It was… purpose.”

“And now you’re leaving them so you can train better.” Cara smiled. “That dedication — I’m impressed.”

“I owe it to them. They trust me with their safety.”

“It’s not a light thing.”

Cobb nodded. But his stomach twisted and he forced his gaze away, looking out at the plains.  _ Maker.  _ It was a responsibility that he could not,  _ would  _ not skip out on. It was not an option. Even if… 

_ No.  _

He’d thought the feelings would disappear along with the Mandalorian, but they were back in his thoughts and there was an ache in his chest to match. He hated that they existed; hated that they wouldn’t go away. He hated that he felt a relentless fluttering in his stomach whenever Mando was around, that his heart pounded from something other adrenaline whenever they were on top of each other. He hated that he craved Mando’s presence. That…

That he was attracted to someone whose face he had never seen, and who certainly did not feel the same.

He kicked another rock, sending it scattering over the ground, and they walked into the city through the gateway. 

The cantina was loud with hunters, as seemed to be the usual scene. It was nothing he wasn’t used to, the rough atmosphere of people who could turn aggressive the moment you bumped into them. As Cara walked to the bar for drinks, Cobb slid into a booth seat, more than ready to try to take his mind off the intrusive thoughts. His muscles ached, but it was an ache that came with the feeling of accomplishment — Cara’s praise was high and he was able to smile to himself. But the feeling couldn’t last, not when it was soon replaced again with thoughts of calloused hands and a raspy voice—

_ Fuck. _

He was pathetic.

_ He’s not like that. He hasn’t showed a lick of interest. Get over it. _

Cara returned with two full mugs of spotchka. The  _ thunk  _ of the drink being set down in front of him drew him out of his thoughts and he looked up before taking hold of it, quick to take and swallow a mouthful. Cara settled across from him and raised her eyebrows, taking her own small sip. “You okay, there?”

“I’m fucked,” he sighed.

She tilted her head to the side, then sipped again. “This sounds like a story.”

“I…” Cobb rubbed at his eyes, then swallowed down another mouthful. “Maker. I’m feelin’ things I shouldn’t, and…” He huffed. “Have you had feelings for someone you shouldn’t?”

Cara stared at him. She straightened, mouth gaping for a moment before seeming to recover. “Are you…  _ him?” _

Cobb pressed his lips in a thin line, face heating with embarrassment. “Help.”

“You have feelings for  _ Mando.” _

“And I  _ can’t.”  _ He let out a frustrated huff. “I ca— I don’t  _ know.  _ I don’t know what to do with myself. But there was something back when I first met him, there’s been something ever since, when I’ve never even seen the man’s  _ face.” _

“Do you think he feels the same?”

Cobb leaned back. “It’s not worth the damage if he doesn’t,” he said, his voice falling soft. “I don’t know if he even likes men, much less  _ me.” _

Cara bit her lip. “I wouldn’t know, either,” she said. “There was… a woman, once, back when we first met. We were helping to defend a village from raiders and there was a widow. They were so…  _ obvious  _ about how they felt, that there was interest. But nothing happened.”

“So he likes  _ women,  _ but—” Cobb sighed. “I dunno why I should even worry. Even if he liked me, we’re just gonna have to end it. I have my town. He’s gotta find a home for that kid. It’s not going to work.”

Cara frowned. She sipped her drink, expression thoughtful. “If he  _ were  _ interested,” she said. “You might have time to still enjoy  _ something.  _ Only, you’d have to break it off eventually. The other option is that you figure out how to stop thinking of him like that.”

“That’s what I’m trying to do.” Cobb shook his head and rubbed at his eyes again, then leaned back. “But it’s… his  _ voice,  _ that  _ kid,  _ it’s all… I want to be  _ part  _ of it. Whatever they’re doing, I want to be there.”

Cara wore a thoughtful expression, leaning her cheek into her hand. “You’re fucked,” she agreed.

Cobb threw his gaze out towards the rest of the cantina, face burning as his stomach twisted. He  _ hated  _ this. In another situation, he would have been able to conjure up enough confidence to woo someone without all this heartache. He would have made a move and taken either the acceptance or rejection. But the Mandalorian and his child were not something he could afford to mess up with and surely he was doomed to this pining.

“I wish I could tell you something better,” Cara said. “But Mando’s… a private person. I talked to him about how he felt for that woman  _ once  _ and he didn’t admit to anything. Honestly, if anything were to happen between you two, I think you’d have to be the one who initiates.”

_ “No.” _

Cara shrugged. “... What about after?”

“After.”

“You have to return to Tatooine. He has to return the child. But what about  _ after  _ he finds the jedi?” Cara leaned forward and smiled before sipping her spotchka. “If you were  _ both  _ to protect Mos Pelgo? Or if the townspeople were able to protect themselves without you.”

“... I couldn’t just leave,” Cobb said, his voice quiet. “And I wouldn’t ask him to stay in a place like Mos Pelgo for me.”

“You might not have to ask,” Cara said.

Cobb looked up, then let out a sigh. “We were talking to Karga before he left,” he said. “Introduced myself as his partner. Got taken the wrong way. Mando almost seemed mad about it.”

Footsteps approached from behind and Cara’s eyes shifted past him. Cobb turned as Greef Karga came to the edge of the table, a charming smile on his face as he looked between both Cobb and Cara. “Afternoon,” he greeted.

“Ahoy,” Cobb said.

“Mando isn’t back yet, I see.”

“Any day,” Cara said, taking a sip of spotchka.

“And you’re drinking on the clock,” Karga grumbled, but there was no real bite in it and Cara shrugged. His gaze turned towards Cobb and he grinned. “The partner! I hear I may have you as one of my hunters soon.”

Cobb leaned back. “That’s what I’ve been told,” he said.

“If it’s on Mando’s word, I’ll trust it.” Karga chuckled, but his gaze turned towards Cara and it dropped into something far more serious. “... I need you. There’s an update on our… situation that we’ve been monitoring.”

Cara frowned. She nodded and took a final swig of her spotchka, emptying the mug, before she climbed out of the booth. “Sorry,” she said, “Nevarro business. Meet you back at my place?”

Cobb nodded and sipped at his drink. He turned to watch them leave, heading through the crowd of hunters to the door, and they disappeared through with the door shutting behind them. The common house was at a low rumble of volume and Cobb turned back straight with his hands on the table. His fingers drummed against it and he sighed.

He reached out and took a long sip of spotchka, this time paying more attention to its burn. He leaned his cheek in his hand and ran his fingers around the rim of the glass with a discontent sensation in his stomach, Cara’s words running through his mind once again. Maybe,  _ somehow,  _ they could have an After. Maybe there was a version of this story where a Mandalorian really was willing to follow him to a tiny Tatooinian town where the excitement dropped to zero. Where water was scarce and the food lackluster. Where his bed was barely comfortable for one person with little room for a second.

No. There wasn’t going to be an After. He couldn’t give up on his people and Mando wasn’t going to give up on his own life when there was so much more excitement…  _ anywhere.  _ Starting anything now was only going to lead to heartbreak, so if he could just  _ forget… _

_ You want him. _

He took another sip of spotchka.

_ You want that kid. _

He swallowed it down with more force than necessary.

_ You want all of it. _

He was here to train, not fall into a romance straight out of fiction.

Thought of the kid was enough to draw him out of his self-pitying thoughts and he finished off the spotchka, satisfied at the lighter sensation it left him with. The baby was likely awake and lonely by now, and there was no telling how long Cara was going to take. With hope that the drinks were already paid for, Cobb got out of the booth and wiped his mouth with his sleeve. He started for the door.

The hunters were loud. One stepped away from the bar, nearly bumping into him, but he managed to step forward just in time. He rested one hand on his belt and stepped around another person, all of whom paid no attention to him at all. Suddenly, he felt like he were a teenager in Mos Espa again, playing the game of navigating the cantinas without making himself a target for some drunkard. He smiled to himself at memory that now felt silly. A cheer came from the bar and he glanced over—

His shoulder slammed into something hard.

Cobb stumbled back, hands coming up as a glass shattered. The area around them fell quiet and he froze, staring up at a Trandoshan that towered above him. The hunter was decked in armor with a heavy rifle strapped to his back, whirling around now to hiss at Cobb.

“You made me  _ sss… spill  _ my drink,” he growled.

Cobb opened his mouth, then closed it again and lifted his hands in surrender. “My bad,” he said. “Wasn’t looking.”

He moved to step past but a clawed hand grabbed the front of his jacket and shoved him back at arms’ length. Cobb’s eyes widened and he grabbed at the Trandoshan’s wrist. “You can buy me  _ another,”  _ the hunter said, eyes narrowed with fury.

Cobb drew in a breath and set his jaw. “I don’t have any credits,” he said.

“And I don’t have a  _ drink.  _ Because of  _ you.” _

He scowled. “I don’t have anything on me,” he snapped. “I’m sorry about the drink. Let me go.”

“My  _ sss… specialty  _ is people skipping out on what they owe.” The Trandoshan’s grip tightened and Cobb hissed, feeling his jacket’s collar close around his throat. His heart pounded in his chest. “Sure the Marshal wouldn’t care about us  _ sss… serving _ our own justice.”

“She’s my  _ friend.” _

“Oh,  _ sure.” _

Cobb took a breath to steady himself, then shot his hand down to his holster. His fingers grasped his blaster, jerking it up, but a fist slammed across his face and his head snapped to the side. For a moment, he was dazed, and the world almost seemed to spin. The taste of blood began to fill his mouth and he swallowed it back before realizing he was being dragged.

“Hey—“

Fresh air. He only began to gain his bearings when he was thrown and he stumbled back, hitting a stone wall. He heard gasps from the people around, footsteps scattering away, and he pushed himself up onto his hands as a shadow loomed over him.

“It was one drink,” he spat.

He only heard something like a laugh before a fist was coming for his face again, this time blocked by his vambraces. The impact  _ hurt  _ but he shot out his heel, slamming it into the Trandoshan’s knee. There was a hiss before he started to get to his feet. His hand reached for his control panel, but these were not the right vambraces and for a moment he had forgotten he had no armor—

A kick landed against his stomach, knocking the air out of him, and he curled in on himself. His arms were grabbed, slamming him back against the wall again, and another punch did him in. The world was spinning, his head throbbing, and there was pulsating up at his temple. A warm sensation dripped down the side of his face. He was… out of it.

It’d been a long time since something like this.

_ “Hey!” _

A familiar voice rang out, thick with anger. The hits stopped. Cobb stared up, eyes half-lidded, as a shining figure stepped into view. The Trandoshan had frozen on top of him and the hand holding his shirt released as he backed off of Cobb. His vision was hazy, but Mando stood at the edge of the street with his blaster raised. “Mandalorian,” the Trandoshan hissed.

“Get away from him,” Mando said, a deadly edge to his voice.

Cobb’s eyes fell shut as footsteps ran off. His mouth was filled with the taste of blood and when he opened his eyes, Mando was kneeling beside him, hovering over him. Cobb blinked, squinting against the sun behind Mando and the gleam of his silver armor. Gloved fingers were gentle in probing at where his face throbbed, all down the side, and Cobb hissed through his teeth. Mando’s hands eased away, orange fingers covered in sticky blood.

“Something cut you.”

Cobb’s eyes drifted shut. “Right…”

_ “Hey.  _ Look at me.”

Cobb forced his eyes open again and he focused at the center of Mando’s visor. For a moment, Mando only seemed to stare back, frozen in place. The moment passed and Cobb realized he wasn’t completely shiny. Dried blood was splattered across his armor.

“Where’s my kid?” There was a stiffness to the Mandalorian’s voice.

“Cara’s,” Cobb said.

“Can you get up?”

He nodded and lifted his arms. Mando grabbed beneath him, pulling him up to his feet, and he felt woozy but his legs were functioning. Mando’s arm slipped around his waist, the other drawing Cobb’s arm over his shoulders, and they began to walk.

“What happened?”

“Bumped into him. Spilled a drink. Didn’t have credits.”

Mando sighed. The man seemed prone to doing that, but this one sounded deeper, more aggravated, and Cobb was filled with both pain and the shame that he was causing another inconvenience in Mando’s day that may have already been terrible if the blood were any indication.

They made it to Cara’s place in little time, the small apartment already somewhat close to the common house. Mando typed in the code that opened the door and helped Cobb inside, letting it shut behind them. They were immediately greeted with the baby’s happy squeal, who sat fully awake in his pram. At the sight of them, his ears dropped and he made a small whine.

“Sit.”

Cobb didn’t fight it. He slumped onto the edge of Cara’s bed, still feeling…  _ off.  _ Mando reached out the give the baby an affectionate brush of fingers between his ears, then stood at the kitchenette just a few feet away with the sound of running water. The kid looked back and forth between Mando and Cobb, looking nervous at the situation, before his eyes seemed to stick to Cobb. “‘M okay,” Cobb murmured. “Don’t worry, kid.”

Mando turned to look.  _ “Ad’ika,”  _ he said, a tone that commanded that child’s attention. The kid looked at him and Mando shook his head. “No.”

The baby’s head tilted to the side. Mando shook his head again and stepped away from the kitchenette, returning to Cobb with a wet cloth. “Trandoshans are strong,” he said.

“And bastards,” Cobb said.

Mando’s hand paused, but he pressed it to Cobb’s cheek, beginning to wipe away the blood. Cobb almost lifted his hand. He was ready to protest, say he could do it himself. But Mando’s other hand touched his jaw, keeping him steady as he gently wiped, and Cobb swallowed instead.

“Cara can take care of it,” Mando said, his voice turning soft. “You might be concussed.”

“Don’t have the armor anymore.”

Mando’s hand stopped. He got up and stepped back towards the kitchenette, turning on the faucet to squeeze out the blood from the cloth. He opened a cabinet and returned a few moments later with a bandage. “The armor is in bad shape,” he said, careful in wiping away fresh blood. His touch was gentle in pressing a bandage over the cut and Cobb focused on anything but that gentility. “The jetpack’s fuel tank is punctured. Anything could be wrong with the vambraces. I have to look it over before giving it back to you.”

“... I’m getting it back,” Cobb said.

“If I can fix it.”

Cobb smiled.

From behind, the baby whined, demanding their attention. Mando turned and murmured another word in a new language before picking him up, cradling the little one against his shoulder. The kid giggled and snuggled in, a happy warmth seeming to emanate from him, and Cobb leaned back on his hands as he watched the two.

“Thank you,” Mando said. He turned to look down at Cobb. “For watching him.”

“He was great,” Cobb said.

“Good.”

The kid peered down at Cobb from Mando’s shoulder. “Asabaah,” he cooed, reaching a hand down towards Cobb.

Mando turned and placed the kid back into the pram.  _ “No,”  _ he said, voice quiet and tight.

“Baba!”

“I said no.”

Mando grabbed the cloth and stepped back towards the kitchenette, running it under water once again. The baby watched Mando, then looked at Cobb, ears lowered and his pout returning. Cobb furrowed his brows. He wasn’t entirely certain what kind of exchange he had just witnessed.

“Cara should have pain inhibitors somewhere,” Mando muttered, beginning to look through cabinets.

Cobb leaned back, eyes shut as he willed the pain away on his own, and heard the kid’s sad coo. He took a deep breath, and when Mando turned back to him again with pain inhibitors in hand, he looked up. “What was that word you said to him?”

Mando paused. “...  _ Ad’ika,”  _ he said. “It means… little one. Child.”

“In Mandalorian?”

“In Mando’a.”

“Do I get to learn that?”

Mando held out the inhibitors. “Take those,” he said. “I’ll get ice. We can talk about language when you aren’t potentially concussed.”

Cobb chuckled, then took hold of the inhibitors, exhaustion overtaking him. He leaned back on his hands. “Glad you’re back,” he said.

Mando had returned to the child, but just for a moment, his movements paused. “... Glad to be back,” he said, and the kid babbled a string of sounds at him with waving hands. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mando'a  
> Ad'ika - little one/son/daughter
> 
> Thank you for all the love <3 Always appreciated.
> 
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	6. Gearing Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the aftermath, Din decides to move ahead with their training.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feeling the definition of swamped lately, but managed to get this one done.
> 
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Vanth slept soundly.

Din watched from the table. His blaster was taken apart in front of him, each piece meticulously cleaned, if only as a distraction from the thoughts in front of him. He wiped down another piece and set it in its place, hands slowly beginning to put the weapon back together.

“Batu.”

“Shh.”

The kid watched Din from the other side of the table. He sat in place, his bantha plush in his lap, happily chewing on the horn as he watched Din’s hands. He gurgled, holding it close, and made little noises as he sat. Din glanced at him, then clicked the last pieces together and took a deep breath.

“Ba,” the kid said. He twisted around and looked towards where Cobb slept in the hammock. The marshal looked peaceful as he slept, a few years younger when his expression softened and he didn’t look like the weight of a planet sat on his shoulders. He had some nasty bruising on the side of his face, purple lines beneath his eyes from a broken nose that was now set with a small plastoid casting. With the blood gone, it looked significantly less scary. The ice had helped keep the worst of the swelling down.

A broken nose and mild concussive symptoms. He deserved a break to rest, Din thought. The guilt tunneled through him, anyway — he’d taken the armor and left. Cobb could have defended himself better if he’d had it, not taken so many hits and sustained a concussion if he’d been wearing a helmet. 

“Leave him alone,” Din said. “No.”

The kid tilted his head to the side with a frown. “N… Nuh?”

“No.”

“No.”

The baby looked towards Vanth again, but he lowered his ears and returned to nibbling at the bantha horn. Din sighed. The kid _could_ heal him — surely a small fracture and some bruising wasn’t on the same scale as lifting a Mudhorn, curing lethal poison or throwing back a wall of fire. But Din imagined Vanth waking to it, finding every pain healed during the course of a nap, the questions Din would have to answer. Telling Vanth about the kid and his powers, desperately hoping for acceptance, that Vanth wouldn’t decide this was more than he’d signed up for and ask to go home.

It would hurt. To get back on the Crest and return to Tatooine so much earlier than planned, watching Vanth get off and not look back. The thought made his chest tighten and his throat go dry. Was it selfish to be hiding secrets, keeping him in the dark, just because Din was afraid of the possibilities? Surely, not knowing wasn’t going to hurt him.

Behind Din, the door opened, and Din’s hand shot for the blaster only to relax. He looked back at Cara. “Quiet,” he said, a little harsher than he intended. The baby cooed. “Sleeping.”

Cara looked at him with wide eyes, then towards Vanth, and relaxed. “Okay,” she whispered, and walked over to the table. “Are you good?”

Din slipped the blaster back into his holster with a _click_ and nodded. “Have you found him?”

“He’s like the wind. Probably holed up somewhere, hoping the Mandalorian disappears.” Cara smiled and sat on her bed, elbows on her knees. “Trandoshans stand out. If he’s smart and disappeared, fine by me. If not, he’ll face the law for attacking Cobb.”

“I’d rather find him myself,” Din muttered, his hands flexing on the table. He looked towards Vanth. “Not just _wait_ around and be afraid to let him out of sight again.”

“Din.”

His name was enough for his head to snap towards Cara. Hearing his name on her lips was like a stab of electricity through him, demanding his attention, somehow enough to cut through the haze of his anxious thoughts.

“I’m the marshal here. I’m pissed that it happened, too. But let me do my job.”

Din glanced at her and swallowed, then leaned back in his seat. “Fine,” he said, letting out a breath. Soft mumbling drew his attention and he looked up as Vanth murmured unintelligibly in his sleep, turning over in the hammock before burying his face in the pillow again. His hair was mussed and pressed, leaving it a mess that was somehow more attractive than its usual sweep back.

Cara cleared her throat.

Din looked over and found her eyeing him with a knowing look. His face heated and he looked away again, instead turning his gaze on the kid. “Stop,” he murmured, reaching out to grab the bantha toy. The baby whined. “Don’t chew. I’ll have to sew it again.”

The baby pouted.

Cara shifted on the bed and silence reigned until she broke it again. “We need your help with something,” she said. “There’s a… small problem. It’s something you’d be interested in helping with. Might be good practice for him.”

Din frowned and looked at her as the baby tried to grab the toy back. “What is it?”

“Come with me,” Cara said, and stood. Her voice turned serious, and by the look in her eyes, it was not going to be anything too good. His brows furrowed and he stood as well, glancing towards the child and Vanth. The kid cooed. “It’ll be easier to show you.”

“Stay here,” Din said. “Keep an eye on—”

“Mando?”

From the hammock, Vanth’s eyes blinked open. He turned over onto his back, expression exhausted, and he peered at Din from across the room. Din hesitated for a moment, flexing his hands — he didn’t want to let Vanth out of sight again, but couldn’t ignore Cara either.

“We’ll be back,” Din said. “... With the armor.”

Vanth watched him, eyes widening just slightly, before he nodded. He squeezed his eyes shut again and ran a hand through his hair, brushing it back, and Din wrenched himself the other way. “Let’s go,” he muttered, and Cara raised her eyebrows at him before they walked out onto the street.

“You think an Imperial base can be his first mission?”

Cara trailed behind him as they walked beyond the gateway. The information was swirling in his head — the base wasn’t incredibly far. There likely wouldn’t be any more stormtroopers than they had faced down within the city, and it _would_ be good practice at utilizing the armor beyond what Vanth might have before.

“A fourth man will help,” Cara said. “He could take on a stormtrooper, no problem. Besides, if you can fix up the armor again — he’s already used to it.”

Din reached the ramp of the Crest and walked up, heading for the weapons closet where the bundle of armor was stored. He crouched down and pulled it out, the pieces all held together by a rope, and Cara stood nearby the watch. He untied the knot and each separate piece fell to the floor with a _clunk,_ his hands reaching first for the jetpack. He turned it over and examined the punctured tank, empty of fuel, while the other was a quarter full. The entire piece was busted up and chipped like it had gone through a Sarlacc’s stomach.

“Can you fix that hole?” Cara asked.

Din nodded. “I have extra tanks. Fuel to fill up with. Just depends on if I have the right tanks.” He set down the jetpack and reached for the vambraces, picking them up. “... Need to fix these up, too.”

He wasn’t sure what weaponry the pieces were capable of while Vanth wore them, but now, it was easier to tell. The right gauntlet had retractable blades that lined down the side and a wrist laser, and when he looked at the left, saw a flamethrower pipe and a whipcord launcher embedded in the underside. There were controls for the helmet and weaponry, but he’d never seen Vanth touch any of it.

The blades only shot out halfway. Din could pull them further, but something was sticking. The laser looked okay. The whipcord launcher was empty, and the flamethrower seemed to siphon its fuel from the jetpack. But when he gave it a try, there was no actual flame.

“How urgent is this mission?” Din asked, looking at it all. He got up and looked into the locker, reaching for a toolbox. “I’ll need the day to take care of all this. Another for getting him acclimated. He’s still concussed.”

“We can wait.” Cara crossed her arms. “I guess you’ll need him to _yourself_ for the armor training.”

Din paused, then began to gather the armor back together, slipping the rope through the vambraces to tie it together. “Unless you wanted to watch,” he said. Her glanced at her face and frowned at the expression there, almost _knowing,_ and he bit his tongue. No, there was no way that she knew. He hadn’t breathed a word. Surely, being protective of the person who relied on him wasn’t enough of a hint about _feelings._

“I think I’m good. I’ve got some things I need to do, so I’ll leave you to it.”

Din watched Cara walk off the ship, frowning to himself, and turned back towards the locker. He grabbed one of the full spare tanks from the floor and slipped it under his arm, then hauled the armor over one shoulder and took the toolbox into his other hand. He started back down the ramp and followed Cara’s path, heading back towards the city.

At the apartment, Din pressed in the code and the door shot open. For a moment, he stopped with one foot over the threshold. Vanth was lying in the hammock, awake, swaying back and forth slowly with the kid’s head tucked beneath his chin. The baby was fast asleep, a tiny hand gripping Vanth’s bandana, content where he was. Din drew in a breath as Vanth’s eyes shifted to him and he shut the door behind himself, trying to be quiet in setting the armor bundle on the table.

“Need you,” Din said.

Vanth nodded, then cradled the kid with both hands and was slow in sitting up. The kid’s eyes blinked open, but shut again, and Vanth settled him back down on the pillow. The baby let out a soft gurgle, curling up again.

“Can you fix the jetpack?” Vanth whispered, coming over to the table.

“It needs more fix than just the jetpack,” Din said. “All the gauntlet tools are inoperable right now. The blades are sticking, there’s no whipcord length, the flamethrower isn’t getting fuel. The laser might work, though. It looks okay. I don’t know how much control you have over your HUD, either, or if the buttons de-programmed.”

Vanth didn’t respond. Din looked up at him and the marshal was staring back with a wide-eyed look, his eyes darting to the vambraces. He opened the mouth to speak, but closed it, and Din slowly continued to unpack the bundle. “I’m guessing you didn’t know about any of that,” he said.

“I didn’t realize that I… had those.”

“Well, you wouldn’t when they’re broken.” Din sank into a chair and grabbed the toolkit, first taking a small spray. He picked up the right vambrace and extended the blades, which popped out halfway with a _snap,_ and he forced them out completely with a pull. Vanth stared, dropping into the other seat to watch, and they sat in silence while Din cleaned away the dark stickiness that was holding the blades back. He had to scrub, but within a few minutes, the gunk was gone. The blades extended with ease.

It was slow work. At some point, the kid woke. He whined for them and Vanth got up to retrieve him, letting the little one sit on the table, and he watched Din work with interest. As Din took a spare coil of whipcord and opened the panel to replace it, Vanth reached for the helmet.

“Didn’t realize how much more there was.” Vanth slipped it on and his voice changed through the modulator. The baby cooed, looking up to watch him. “Could’a been using fire this whole time?”

“You saw me use the thrower,” Din said.

“Yeah, well, didn’t click that _I_ had it, too. You’re lookin’ all shiny and new. Figured you had better tech than me.”

“Beskar can withstand plenty. Whatever this set has been through — seems half of it didn’t survive. Burns and slashes all over.”

“Think the original owner could still be alive?”

“I would be surprised.” The whipcord clicked into place and Din covered it up again with the panel. The end of the spool was locked in, and visually, seemed ready to fire. He glanced towards the rhythmic lantern above on the ceiling — it was dimming down. The sun must be setting. “... Are you comfortable enough with the armor to help us with something?”

Vanth looked up. The kid was standing beneath him, reaching up, trying to catch his claws against the rim of the helmet. “What do you need help with?”

“There’s an Imperial base on Nevarro,” Din said. “Miles out, but too close to this place for comfort. Should be dead, but it’s a military holdout with only a skeleton crew left. If we clear them out, it cracks down on any Imperial presence and Nevarro will be completely safe.”

Vanth nodded. He took off the helmet and grinned. “Always dreamt of getting to shoot one of them shiny bast—” he paused and lowered the helmet over the kid. The baby squeaked and patted against the inside. “... Bastards.”

“Well, this will be your chance to kill as many as you can,” Din said. He watched the baby pull up the helmet’s edge, peering out at him, and he reached out to pick it up. The kid gurgled again but Din flipped the helmet over to look inside. “How does your HUD work?”

“HUD?”

“Your helmet display,” Din said. “What you look through.”

“The visor.”

“No,” Din said. “The HUD. It’s — your screen.”

“I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.”

Din frowned and turned the helmet, looking in at where the visor was set into the helmet, but it was… just the visor. There was no HUD at all, although maybe it was removed or damaged beyond use. “You… look through the _visor?”_

“... What’ve _you_ got in there?”

“A HUD for — to actually _see._ Thermal and night vision. You can actually shoot with this on?”

“Got used to it,” Vanth said. “Can’t see anythin’ that isn’t head on, though. No peripheral vision.”

“You don’t have a seal, either. Not even a strap to keep it on. This is the worst-made helmet I’ve ever seen.”

“It’s _my_ helmet,” Vanth grumbled.

Din set the helmet back down on the table and the kid wandered towards it, cooing as he looked into the black of the visor. Din reached for the cuirass and looked it over — at least it was one of the pieces in good shape. “Made for someone shorter than you,” he said. “Your middle is completely open.”

“Mando,” Vanth said. “It’s worked for me so far.”

Din glanced at him, then sighed and settled it down. “Right.” He looked up at the cuirass. “The beskar has held up, anyway. The bazaar might have the pieces that you’re missing, in durasteel. I need to look this all over, and we can take tomorrow to run through it all.” He glanced at Vanth and his voice softened. “How’s your head?”

Vanth flashed a brief smile. “Headache’s gone away now,” he said. “... Uh, thanks. For showin’ up when you did. Wish I’d been able to fight a _little.”_

“Trandoshans are big,” Din said. “Strong. You didn’t have the armor, and you’re a gunslinger. The odds weren’t in your favor.” His hands paused. “You’re welcome.”

The baby squealed. He turned and wandered towards Din, reaching his hands up, and Din picked him up. The kid settled into his elbow, looking pleased, and Din stroked a thumb over his ears. Vanth leaned back in his seat, taking hold of the helmet again to look at it.

“My Armorer has left,” Din said. “If we were to find her, she has the beskar that was left behind by my tribe. She could forge you a proper suit of armor.”

Vanth looked at him, then his armor, with raised eyebrows. “... I’ve been wonderin’ about that,” he said. “Assuming this Mando’s gone. What’s supposed to happen with armor after a Mandalorian dies?”

Din shifted in his seat. “You give it to the next kin,” he said. “Their _riduur._ Their spouse. If they don’t have a spouse, then their _ad,_ child. Or their _vod,_ sibling, or so on. The armor returns to their family to be re-worn, or melted down and recrafted if it doesn’t fit. The beskar stays within their clan.” He glanced at the painted symbol in the corner of the cuirass. “Families have crests. I don’t know what this one is.”

“How often do Mandos have a child and not a spouse?”

Din glanced at the kid. “Often,” he said. “The Mandalorian who found me never married. Some married because the other was a suitable partner to raise children with, others did it for love.”

“Children sound important,” Vanth said. “I mean, they are, but…”

“To Mandalorians, children are worth the galaxy,” Din said. His voice took on a softer tone as he looked down at the baby again, given a coo. “We take in children who have nowhere else. My code demands that I protect them. Foundlings are the future.”

Vanth smiled. There was a gentleness to his eyes.

With the child settled in his lap, Din got to work on the wiring of the armor, careful in removing the controls of a vambrace to check on the circuits. Soon, the child pawed at Din for attention — and Vanth was the one to scoop him up to play on the floor with the bantha plush.

Din watched them with a smile.

“Feel the same?”

“Feelin’ different, somehow.”

The sky was cloudy above. Din watched with crossed arms as Vanth suited up, clicking the vambraces into place. The cuirass sat snug on him again. The jetpack connected easily. The vambraces and padded, fingerless gloves looked familiar and _right._ After the gauntlets were in place, Vanth dropped to one knee to re-work his boots tighter, and Din eyed the two new durasteel cuisses that were strapped to his thighs. They weren’t beskar, and they weren’t pretty or even really matching. But it was a little more protection from a hit.

“You’ve got new toys,” Din said.

Vanth looked up and grinned. He straightened up and and snapped his right wrist out to the side, blades extending, jagged and curled in design but still sharp. He retracted them back in and bent down to grab his helmet. He slipped it on. “How we gettin’ started?”

“I want to see how the jetpack works for you,” Din said. “Looks like you had decent control of it, but I don’t know how often you actually flew.”

Vanth settled his hands on his lower belt. “Didn’t want to waste fuel,” he said. “But I can fly.”

Din looked to the side, then lifted his arm and pointed. “There’s empty lava tunnels in that direction,” he said. “Nevarro is mostly flatlands or hills where the lava has cooled. The lakes and tunnels are interesting sights.”

“Sounds like a trip,” Vanth said.

Din reached back and looped his cape over his shoulder. He stepped back, hand reaching for his vambrace, and he bent his knees before pushing off. The jetpack roared to life, boosting him several feet into the air, but he pulled his knees up and steadied himself. He hovered above the ground, holding his balance to not tip in any direction. “Beginner’s drill,” he called over the roar of the jets. “Keep control.”

Vanth stepped back, then instead rocked forward and jumped. His own jets burst to life and for a moment, he shot too high and leaned to the side. He quickly righted himself, fingers moving over his vambrace to lower himself down to Din’s level, and there was a trembling sort of tension in his body. He drifted backwards, then leaned forward to right himself, only to almost careen into Din. Din hissed and grabbed onto him, giving him a push back.

“Use your core to control your angle,” he said. “Relax, feel the space you’re in. You’re just staying in place.”

Vanth took in a breath, then steadied. He drifted slightly, but corrected, and he let out the breath. Din smiled, watching, and he began to sway forwards and back. “Start to move,” he said. “But keep the control. Only move how you _want_ to move. It should listen to your commands.”

“Sounds like we’re tamin’ a ronto, with _commands,”_ Vanth grumbled, but he leaned to move. He leaned one way, then the other, this time keeping control. They hovered in the air together. “How’d you learn this?”

“Drills,” Din said. He pressed his vambrace and swung his legs back before pitching himself backwards, curled in as he flipped back. He leveled out again and Vanth stared at him with an unmoving visor. “Flying from point A to B is one thing, and you’ve done that. Close-quarters control is another.”

Vanth looked down at the ground. Then, he began to copy Din, swinging his legs back before flipping over. He steadied himself again and let out a laugh — a nice sound, Din thought, almost like a carefree kid. “Never thought to try that sorta thing,” he said.

“We played games, when we were learning as children,” Din said. He dropped back down to the ground and Vanth followed, their jetpacks shutting off. “Tag. How many rolls you could do without crashing. They taught us basics and let us play so we’d become comfortable on our own.”

“You were a good flier?” Vanth asked. “As a kid?”

“I could fly,” Din said. “I could shoot. I was…” He paused. “Small. It took me longer to grow, start building muscle, compared to the others. Those were my strengths. It’s been a long time, though. I’ve had to relearn.”

Vanth looked at him, then stepped back and hopped back into the air, jetpack roaring. He lifted several feet up, then swung himself around around. Din smiled to himself and crossed his arms. Vanth steadied, then brought his legs forward instead and flipped forward—

Instead, he shot into the dirt with a _thud,_ sprawling out with a groan.

Din’s smile faded and he walked over, coming beside the marshal, who let out a breath as he stared up at Din. “Are you alright?”

“Just fine,” Vanth grumbled. He sat up and reached back to brush dust off his shoulders, then got up to his feet. He rolled his shoulders and leaned his chest out with a huff. “Alright. Those drills, then, huh?”

“The lava tunnels can make for a good course to fly through,” Din said. He pointed to the side again. “A few miles. You can tail me.”

“Or we could make it a good ol’ race,” Vanth said.

Din looked at him and their gazes held. Din could feel the grin beneath his helmet when Vanth stepped forward and launched into the sky, leaving Din behind on the dusty surface, and Din hesitated for only a moment. He wondered how exactly he’d managed to unlock the inner child of this man when he started at a run and shot into the sky to follow. He could at least try to win.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The art of the baby is by [Red Velvet Panda](https://red-velvet-panda.tumblr.com/), whose art for me has always been breathtaking.
> 
> Links:  
> New Sands of Time [discord](https://discord.gg/zEwyCKqrcB)  
> [Tumblr](https://coffeequill.tumblr.com/)  
> [Twitter](https://twitter.com/coffee_quill)


	7. Secrets Soon Uncovered

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “We’re grabbing the kid and leaving,” he said. “We can’t afford to wait around.”
> 
> “Why not?” Vanth demanded. “Who’s Gideon?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New Sands of Time [discord](https://discord.gg/zEwyCKqrcB)  
> [Tumblr](https://coffeequill.tumblr.com/)  
> [Twitter](https://twitter.com/coffee_quill)

The speeder was not meant for five people. “We have jetpacks,” Din had said, gesturing to him and Vanth. “We don’t need to ride.” But Karga insisted that the Mythrol drive it, anyway, to not force Din and Vanth to somehow carry him and Cara with them. Din reluctantly agreed, wary of putting that weight on either of them. Vanth had gotten a few days now of jetpack drilling, but even for Din, carrying a person for long wasn’t enjoyable.

They all fit on, anyway. While Cara and the Mythrol sat in the front, Karga settled in the center of the two backseats, Din and Vanth perching on the sides facing inwards.

“The whole base is powered by a reactor,” Karga said, looking towards Din. Din glanced at him.

“We sneak in, overload the reactor, and get the _hell_ out of there,” Cara said.

“Let’s be fast,” Din muttered. He glanced towards the Mythrol. “And keep the speeder running.”

“There it is, right up there.” Din and Vanth both leaned to look, watching as they sped past the bend in the canyon wall. The Imperial base was built into the ledge, up and away from the lava tides while still small enough to not reveal its entire structure that had burrowed in. They glanced at each other, and Vanth shifted his feet on the seat, one hand adjusting his helmet in his lap while the other gripped the edge of the speeder.

“How close do you want me to drop you off?” the Mythrol asked.

“About the front door,” Karga said.

“... A little close for a civilian, don’tcha think?”

“I’ve got two choices for ya.” Karga’s voice took on the edge that Din often heard him use with his hunters, the tone of _don’t try me._ “You take us in and I knock a hundred years off your debt.”

Vanth looked towards Karga. The sudden jerk of his head drew Din’s attention and Din felt his stomach twist as Vanth’s expression tinted sour.

“... Or?”

“Or I leave you out here in the lava flats to walk home with whatever’s left in your humidity vest.”

“Not much of a choice, is it?” the Mythrol muttered. Din resisted the urge to kick against Karga. Vanth looked away and forward, eyes fixating on the base as it came closer, and Din mouthed a curse to himself. Maybe it would have been better for them to fly, judging by Vanth’s irritated expression.

Din shook the thought off. The kid was… safe, planted by Cara in the new schoolhouse, a place where Din had been hesitant to leave him and only convinced by both Karga and Cara’s insistence. They would get in, they would get out, and Din would have the kid back in his sight.

As they approached the door, the speeder slowed to a stop. “Alright, we can’t go any further than this,” the Mythrol said, the engines powering down.

“Let’s go,” Karga said.

They piled out of the speeder. Din swung his legs around and hopped off, drawing his blaster, as Vanth pulled on the helmet. They each walked towards the lift with their blasters drawn, gazes scanning what they were facing. The lift was a single tube leading up, nothing else built into the rockface. Din walked towards the controls and pressed a button, then a few switches, before he sighed.

“Controls are useless. They’re melted.”

“Well, it’s probably not rated for lava,” Karga grumbled.

“Imperial trash,” Cara spat.

Din stepped away and looked around. He glanced at Vanth, who was already looking at him, then turned his gaze up towards the base above. He squinted through his HUD, barely listening as Karga and the Mythrol squabbled again, instead eyeing the ledge that stuck out from the cliff. “Vanth,” he said.

The marshal walked over. His gaze followed Din’s towards the ledge, and he shifted his grip on his carbine rifle. “We goin’ up?” he asked.

Din nodded. “Land,” he muttered. “Ready to shoot.” He turned and looked towards the other three as Vanth reached for his vambrace. “Hold tight.”

He braced and pushed off the ground, jetpack lifting him into the air, with Vanth following just a touch behind. It was an easy flight straight up, several seconds long as Din followed the face of the canyon to keep in line. He landed on the platform in a low crouch, wincing at the sharp crack of his knees, while Vanth landed in a stumble. He quickly righted himself just as Din stood.

“HEY!”

Din’s gaze jerked to the side and he pulled his blaster just as Vanth shot the first trooper. He only spotted four in total, two falling in an instant from their shots, while the remainders dove for cover. They landed behind cargo crates that acted as blockades, lifting their guns to shoot back. A bolt caught Din in the chest, deflecting off the beskar as he stumbled back with a hiss. “Get the lift,” he said, firing back at the trooper.

Vanth nodded and set off for the lift shaft. Their guns turned on him but Din fired another shot to draw them back, catching one trooper in the shoulder. The trooper stumbled back, but the other leapt out from his hiding place, rushing at Din. He fired a shot and Din hissed at it deflected off his pauldron, throwing his shoulder back, but he reset just as the trooper reached him. He ducked down to grab his waist and shove him over the side, foot planted for the man to trip over. He fell over the side with a scream as Din twisted to shoot the last trooper again.

“Clear?” Din asked.

“Clear,” Vanth said. He stood by the lift, his carbine’s muzzle lowered in relaxation. “... Feels good to kill the white shells.”

Din just frowned, gaze darting across the bodies. The lift door opened with a soft _swish_ and he looked to Cara, Karga, and the Mythrol. “Empty base, huh?” he said as they stepped out, gazes sweeping across the bodies themselves.

They didn’t answer. Cara walked towards the edge and Vanth stepped to follow, both looking down the rock wall. _“That’s high.”_ Din looked over, barely catching Vanth’s softly uttered Huttese.

“The reactor should be set in the heat shaft,” Karga said. Din looked towards him. “If we drain the cooling lines, this whole base will go up in a matter of minutes.”

“How much time we got to get out?” Vanth asked.

“Just enough,” Karga said.

Vanth’s helmet turned towards him and Din nodded. As they began towards the door, he came to Din’s other side, opposite of Cara. Their strides matched and their gazes darted all over, adrenaline pumping for them all.

“Stay close,” Din muttered to Vanth, who nodded.

They made their way to the command center with little issue, passing a handful of troopers who took no notice of their group. They stacked up on either side of the door to command, the door opening with a quiet _swish,_ unnoticed completely by the lone officer. Din nodded to Cara, who looked at him before holstering her gun and stepping in.

“Shuttle bay? Shuttle bay, this is…”

Cara didn’t hesitate, throwing her arms around the officer’s neck and dragging him out of his chair. He grabbed at her arms, kicking as he choked, but he quickly fell unconscious and Din was taking his place. As Karga and the Mythrol began to search through his pockets, Cara and Vanth kept their eyes on the door, guns relaxed but ready.

“This will come in handy,” Karga muttered, pulling out the code cylinder. Din shut down each security camera, quickly searching for a map of the base, until the location of the heat shaft popped up. His eyes scanned the model. _Straight, right, left, access corridor._ Simple enough.

“I found the heat shaft,” he said and pulled his blaster as he glanced towards Cara. “Let’s go.”

They set off down the hallway again, this time with more purpose. They kept silent, and Cobb didn’t fall in line easily, but he didn’t slow them either. Just as they passed a corridor, troopers walked past and they froze, backing up. Din reached out and grabbed Cobb’s upper arm, jerking him back from walking into sight.

Cobb froze, moving with him, his intake of breath audible. Din looked at him. As the troopers moved on, they slipped past, taking care to keep their footsteps quiet as they watched the patrol pass.

“There, Mythrol. Slice that door.”

The door was quick to open after the code cylinder was connected. They stormed through, stopping at a grate ledge that overlooked the lava core. Din stood at the edge and lowered his blaster, looking down, and put up a hand to stop the Mythrol from leaning too far. His head turned to spot Vanth, who seemed to keep a safer distance.

“That’s it.” Their attention turned to the device beside him. “Get on the reactor controls, drain the coolant lines. We’ll watch the doors.”

“... Me?” The Mythrol asked.

“Yes, you!”

“... I’m afraid o’ heights.” The Mythrol’s voice had a nervous edge to it. Cara’s expression morphed with dislike. “And heat. And lava.”

“How ‘bout if I put ya back in carbonite? Get over there!”

_“Bringing a slave wasn’t part of the plan.”_

Din’s head jerked as the Mythrol made his way to the controls, looking back at Vanth. His chest tightened, stomach churning, even if he couldn’t see Vanth’s expression beneath. _“No slave,”_ he said back, wincing at his own pronunciation. Huttese wasn’t a pleasant language, but it still rolled off a Tatooinian-born’s tongue better than his own. _“Debt.”_

 _“What’s the difference?”_ Vanth demanded.

They looked at each other. Din kept his visor straight but his eyes flickered down, cheeks beginning to burn. He sucked in a breath.

_“You’re okay with it—“_

_“No!”_ Din snapped. _“Not—”_

“She’s gonna blow!”

The Mythrol’s panicked shout drew them both back. The lava hissed and popped below as alarm bells began to ring and in an instant, they began through the halls again. Din paused in the doorway, making sure they were all through, as they took off at a run.

“Destroy it!”

Din hissed as a bolt reflected off his pauldron, arm up to shoot back at the Imperials behind the console. He and Vanth both began to flank the sides of the room as the second Imperial began shooting the computers, only for both to fall quickly. Smoke rose as the bodies hit the ground or slumped over the console, and Din let out a breath, head scanning to clear the room.

“The hell are those?”

Vanth’s voice echoed and Din looked towards him. Vanth reached up and slipped the helmet off, brows furrowed in confused concern, eyes fixed on the wall behind Din. Din turned and froze in place, gaze locked on the…

Tanks.

Cara and Karga walked over, the Mythrol just behind, each staring at the deformed creatures that seemed to float in the icy blue liquid. The air bubbles seemed suspended and he wasn’t sure if they were frozen. It looked… human. Or like it had once been human. Now, it was twisted and deformed like someone had tried to put flesh together in the shape of one.

“What the…” Karga breathed.

“I thought you said this was a forward operating base,” Cara said, looking towards Karga.

“I thought it was,” Karga said, his voice soft.

“No,” Cara snapped. “This isn’t a military operation. This is a _lab.”_ She turned towards the Mythrol. “We need to get into the system and figure out what’s going on.”

“What about the react—“

“Do it! … _Do it.”_

Din stared at the creatures with a growing twist in his stomach. “I don’t like this,” he muttered, looking into the tanks. He couldn’t deny that thoughts of the Client and Pershing were coming to the surface, a conversation he’d overheard of samples and the bio-droid that had hovered over the child in the safehouse. His hands tightened at his sides.

“Have ya ever seen anything like this?” Cobb whispered, turned towards him with eyes locked on the specimens.

“No,” Din said. He didn’t voice his thoughts aloud. Perhaps it was the remnants of whatever had been attempted with the child. It… had failed, surely. Whatever was in these tanks couldn’t possibly be considered success at whatever the attempts had been.

“Think it’s cloning?” Vanth looked at him. “Heard about that sort of thing in Mos Eisley. That it’s possible.”

“I don’t think—“

Behind them, a holo crackled to life. As a familiar voice began to play, and Din turned with an icy feeling spreading over his body.

“No. This recording’s three days old.”

Din stared at the Mythrol. “If Gideon’s alive, then…”

“Over there!”

At the shout of a stormtrooper, his thoughts were shattered and they began to fire back. Vanth threw his helmet back on and slipped behind the console for cover as Din and Cara backed away towards the wall. His heart was pounding, his stomach twisting itself into knots as the information began to sink in.

Gideon was alive.

“We have them!”

Din shot down the trooper just as the words left his mouth and when the last trooper fell, he lowered his arm. He turned towards Cara, beginning to walk backward.

“I need to get the kid,” he said, trying to keep the panic from his voice.

“Jet back,” Cara said, nodding as she kept her arm held high. “You're faster that way. We’ll head to the speeder and meet you in town!”

Din nodded back and his gaze turned towards Vanth, jerking his head to gesture. “Let’s go,” he said.

Vanth didn’t hesitate to follow and they turned, running through the corridors. He gripped the carbine, just behind Din as he made a turn. “Back to the core,” Din muttered, “the shaft leads up. Jet back from there.”

“Who’s Moff Gideon—“

They curved around a corner. Din barely registered the sound of a trooper speaking and his hand jerked up, shooting at the white armor the second it was in view. _Left here. No, right._ He skidded to a stop before making the wrong turn, arm coming up to grab Vanth from the same mistake. “Other way,” he hissed, suddenly grateful for the tread of his boots. Vanth nearly slipped, both recovering to head the opposite way. “Go!”

They reached the core, coming to a stop. Din looked down at the lava where it was becoming unstable, the unbearable heat of the room, and looked up towards the blue sky. He set his feet, hand reaching for his controls, when Vanth hissed out a _“Mando!”_ and fired off a shot at a trooper across the shaft. Din looked up, then felt a shot ricochet off his pauldron with a second _ping_ of beskar beside him. Vanth hissed at the impact and stumbled forward, feet tripping.

“No!” Din shouted, a bolt of fear striking through his chest.

Vanth caught onto the edge of the grate with a hiss, clinging to the ledge. He lifted his blaster, still clutched in his hand, and shot back at the troopers before his jetpack roared. He shot up and Din felt the horrible mismatch of panic and relief before he followed. They flew free of the lava shaft, blaster bolts firing at their tails. Din shot the two troopers at the top and they collapsed before the two landed.

Din hissed, landing on one knee before he got up. Vanth stumbled and dropped into a roll but was quick to get back up, looking at Din with a heaving chest.

A shot hit his pauldron and Din winced, whipping around. He fired off a shot at the trooper, then looked at Vanth. “Let’s go,” he said. “All your stuff on the Crest?”

Vanth let out a tired breath. “Yes.”

“Good. Fly.”

Vanth turned and ran with him towards the edge of the canyon. At the edge, their jetpacks burst to life, sending them hurtling back towards the town. Din turned to be sure Vanth was there, and their visors held before Din held up two fingers. Vanth nodded and both reached for the sides of their helmets.

“We’re grabbing the kid and leaving,” he said. “We can’t afford to wait around.”

“Why not?” Vanth demanded. “Who’s Gideon? They can’t have meant _your_ kid when they said the child.”

“No,” Din said, his voice coming strained. “They’re talking about him. We’re not safe staying in one place.”

“You gotta explain this stuff, Mando. Seems I’m the only one who doesn’t know.”

“Moff Gideon is an Imperial who wants the child,” Din said. “I thought he was dead. If he’s alive, the kid is in danger. I can explain everything when we’re in hyperspace.”

Vanth let out a huff that barely made it through the comms. But it was enough for Din to feel a stab of guilt for keeping him in the dark. He should have been more open when they first negotiated this, he thought. He should have laid it all out, even if it meant scaring Vanth off. His feelings were getting in the way of good decisions.

The rest of the flight back was quiet.

Din didn’t land at the gateway, instead picking out the building that school took place in. He landed on the roof, first, Vanth touching down beside him, before he threw his feet over the edge and jumped. A quick burst of the jets slowed his fall and he landed in a crouch, ignoring the gasps of people nearby, heading right for the door. Vanth was just at his back, though he stopped at the inside.

As Din walked in, every child twisted around to look at him, eyes wide. The droid was still in the middle of their lesson on trade systems, seeming to review it all, but Din paid little attention. “Sir!” it chirped, sounding indignant. “You are disrupting today’s—“

“Sorry,” Din muttered. The kids’ eyes followed him, some in amazement and others looking fearful. He came to where the baby sat — incredibly out of place — and scooped him up. “C’mon, ki—”

Gripped tight in one hand was a sleeve of blue cookies. One such cookie was in his other, with blue crumbs all around his mouth. “... Where did you get those from?”

The baby cooed.

Din just shook his head and tucked the kid into his arms, a hand covering him protectively. Vanth stood in the doorway and turned as Din approached. “Crest,” Din muttered, and they set off into the crowd.

“Hey, kid,” Vanth said. The baby let out a happy squeak, munching away at his cookie as he looked at Vanth. Din stroked his ears, protective anxiety coming over him, as his heart pounded.

The stream of people cleared for them, residents jumping out of the way of two Mandalorian-armored people walking with purpose, and they soon reached the gateway. Din felt a rush of gratitude, again, and now for the sight of the Crest. They ran up the ramp and Din hit the button for the door, starting to shut it before he went for the cockpit. He began to climb up and upon reaching it, settled the kid into one of the seats.

The baby whined, still gripping his sleeve of cookies. He held the half-eaten one up to Din, who shook his head. “No,” he muttered. “I don’t want one.” He clicked the belt snugly around the kid. “... Thank you.”

“Where to, then?” Vanth said.

Din hesitated. He hadn’t put thought towards that yet, his only concern being to get as far away from Nevarro as possible, as fast as possible. He slid into the pilot’s seat and belted himself into place, hands flying for the controls. “Somewhere,” he said.

Somewhere safe.

Somewhere no one would notice them.

The Razor Crest lifted off the ground and they shot into the sky. A creeping feeling came over him and instead of turning towards the atmosphere, he ran the scanners and began back towards the canyons. “Make sure they got back,” he muttered. The creeping feeling only intensified as he leaned to look at the fields in front of them, no sign of a speeder anywhere.

Din ran the scanners a second time, settling on flying back to the base and retracing the route when the scanners let out an alarming beep. He looked down and spotted the five dots, one in the lead, and chased by the other four. They shot past and Din cursed beneath his breath, wrenching the Crest back around. He heard Vanth’s feet brace against the floor and he thrust the controls forward, the four pursuers dropped to three.

“TIE fighters,” he muttered. “They won’t make it across the field.”

The baby squeaked.

Din reached for the guns and the Crest locked onto the center TIE. He pulled the trigger, cannons firing, and he smiled to himself as the TIE blew apart in the explosion. They swooped over a speeding Trawler and Din glanced back at the baby. “Hang on,” he muttered to both passengers, pushing forward the thrusters. As the TIEs split, he locked onto the one splitting right.

He leaned the controls back, turning vertical, as he began to shoot through the clouds. Behind him, the baby giggled, and Vanth let out a heavy breath. He tilted side to side, keeping the engines out of aim, as he chased the TIE higher and higher. They’d break the atmosphere soon. As blue skies began to dark, Din squeezed the trigger.

The TIE broke apart with an explosion, silent outside the Crest.

Still, one left.

Din wrenched the Crest again, hands working automatically. The baby shrieked with excitement, then another crunch of the cookie, before the ship faced the ground. The hull creaked, for a moment everything silent.

“Mando,“ Vanth breathed out. _“Mando—“_

The engines fired up and they shot back towards the ground and towards the last TIE. He knew he was just a little bit insane in how he flew. He knew his maneuvers asked for more than the Razor Crest was made for. And even now he could imagine his previous passengers over the years, screaming that he must have a death wish even if he had just gotten them out of a chase. As he wrenched the controls, locked onto the TIE, the Crest rolled again and again.

The baby shrieked again, crying out in delight, while Vanth was silent. The TIE shot back but missed every time. Din watched the targeting system, waiting as they spiraled down, engines spinning and his stomach steeled—

His guns locked on and he fired, blowing the TIE into a fiery blaze. He swerved the controls and leveled out, grinning to himself, and looked back at the baby. “Not too bad, huh, kid—“

The baby stared at him, looking woozy, then promptly spit up what had once been blue cookies. “Oh, boy,” he muttered, sparing a glance towards Vanth, who gripped his seatbelt with one hand and braced the other against the wall. He looked at Din with wide eyes, most definitely a shade of green. “... Not you, too.”

Vanth swallowed.

At a soft ping, Din turned on the comms and then swiveled around again, grabbing his cape to dab at the kid’s mouth and robe.

 _“That was some pretty impressive flying, Mando.”_ Karga’s voice filtered through, clear awe in his voice. _“What do I owe ya?”_

“Let’s shelve it for later,” Din said. “Might need it eventually.”

Karga chuckled. _“Can I at least buy you a drink?”_

“Sorry. I have some… onboard maintenance and such to take care of.” He glanced back at the kid again. Vanth looked a little better, expression still looking uncomfortable. No, he wasn’t used to flying, much less that kind. “And we gotta hit the road before Gideon catches wise.”

_“Well, good luck flying, my friend.”_

They soared over Nevarro, the town disappearing beneath them, and Din took a deep breath as his nerves began to calm. He finished wiping up the baby as best as he could, then centered his attention, turning the controls up. They headed for the stars, this time with the kid having a little less fun after vomiting up the cookies. Blue skies were replaced with the twinkling black expanse, and after the last few minutes of quiet, Din began to cycle through the computer for previous coordinates.

“Where to?”

“... Sorgan,” Din said.

The kid perked up with a soft “ah?” at the name.

“Never heard of it,” Vanth muttered.

“It’ll take a while to get there. Green, forests, ponds. It’s quiet, low population.” Din reached for the hyperdrive, the coordinates locked into place. He reached for the lever and pulled it, the stars beginning to streak past, and they shot forward through the galaxy. “I know a village that can house us before we figure out what’s next. Krill farmers.”

They lapsed into quiet. Din’s hands moved and he switched the ship over to complete autopilot, turning to get up, and Vanth looked up at him. He reached down to unbuckle the kid, making a face at the state of his clothes. “Let’s clean you up,” he said.

Before he could step out of the cockpit, Vanth stood up, shoving his hand against the doorway to block it. “Who is Moff Gideon?” he demanded, fixing Din with a hard gaze. “What’s he got to do with the kid and what’s going _on?”_

Din stared at him. The baby made a concerned sound and twisted to peer at Vanth with big eyes. Vanth didn’t budge but swallowed, and Din could see the nerves beneath.

“Gotta trust me so I can trust you,” Vanth said, his voice quiet.

Din looked down at the kid and stroked a thumb over his back. “Let me go down, clean him up,” he said in a soft voice. “Then we’ll talk. I’ll explain all of it. We’ve got time.”

Vanth frowned, but after a moment he conceded, stepping back from the doorway. Din stepped through and began down to the cargo hold. As he took off the kid’s outer robe to throw in the wash, taking care to properly clean his mouth, he tried to think of a good way to explain things.

When he finished, and the kid’s robe was clean, he redressed him. Vanth leaned against the ladder to watch and now Din looked at him, leaned against the opposite wall. “So,” Vanth said.

“So,” Din said. The kid mumbled, growing sleepy. Din looked down and gently bounced him, then finally returned his gaze to Vanth.

He started from the beginning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies on this chapter, and its wait. Really fought me for a long while, but here marks the start of my formal "fuck you" to canon. (It's been my trademark). Except for... certain subplots, I'm committing to the canon divergence tag. My sandbox gets to expand, now.
> 
> Thanks for reading <3 
> 
> New Sands of Time [discord](https://discord.gg/zEwyCKqrcB)  
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> [Twitter](https://twitter.com/coffee_quill)


	8. Puddles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Explanations given, old friends found again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New Sands of Time [discord](https://discord.gg/zEwyCKqrcB)  
> [Tumblr](https://coffeequill.tumblr.com/) (I made a new tumblr! If you followed before, you might still be following my old account.)  
> [Twitter](https://twitter.com/coffee_quill)

He started slow. The details had to be picked and chosen carefully when he was no storyteller. He had no trust in himself to not mix it all up.

“I was a bounty hunter,” he began. Vanth nodded. “I worked for Karga. My tribe made a covert below the city, in the sewers, living in secrecy. We would only send one person above ground to work and provide for the tribe, so that we were not risking many members at once when we were so small. It was my turn.”

They were sitting on the floor now, jetpacks off and facing opposite walls. The baby slept away in Din’s arms, tucked into the crook of his arm and a small clawed hand dug into his sleeve.

“I took a high-paying bounty from a private client,” Din said. “It wasn’t… the normal way of doing things. Work came through the Guild. But the reward was beskar, an entire camtono of ingots, enough for a full suit. No one else had achieved the bounty and I was sent to Arvala-7 to hunt down a 50-year-old man.”

Vanth’s brows furrowed and he didn’t speak, but his eyes drifted down to the kid and his lips parted for a moment. His expression darkened. 

“The tracking fob led me to the kid. Guarded by mercs.” Din paused. “Never told me I was hunting a child.”

Vanth watched him, chest rising and falling with a breath, and Din could see his eyes roaming over both of them. 

“The code as a bounty hunter is to not ask questions,” Din said. He shifted his legs, outstretched in front of him, and doubt began to creep into his voice. “I took my payment, it was over. But Mandalorians protect children. I went back for him. We were hunted for months. Came back, tried to put together a trap, kill the Client.”

The thought of Kuiil crept into his mind and he swallowed.

“Moff Gideon was an ISB officer,” he continued. “He oversaw the Purge of the Mandalorians. The destruction of Mandalore.  _ He’s  _ the one who wants the child for his… powers.”

“Powers?” Vanth repeated.

“I’ve been trying to hide them,” Din said. He looked down at the child, gentle in adjusting his cradle. “I… didn’t know how you would react. He can move things with his mind, heal injuries.”

“Sounds like a  _ jedi,”  _ Vanth said. 

Din’s head snapped up to look at him. “You know about the jedi?” he demanded. “I don’t know a — how?”

Vanth frowned again and drew his legs into a cross. He made a vague hand gesture, “Heard the name in Mos Espa, when I was a smaller kid. Starpilots came through, mentionin’ bout jedi and such. Warriors with magic. Always seemed a bit o’ a wives tale — most people sayin’ they weren’t real, a few saying they were.” He shrugged. “Just seemed a nice story.”

“I was sent by my Armorer to find them and return the child,” Din said. “I thought I had killed Gideon, but if he’s alive, the kid will never be safe. I should have told you. If you want to go back to Mos Pelgo, I’ll… change course now. It would be fair.”

Vanth was quiet. He looked at Din with an analytical expression, hardened and not particularly happy. But his eyes dropped and he took his helmet in his lap, looking down at the visor. “Would’ve liked to know at the start,” he said, in a quiet voice. “This ain’t nothing like I thought was goin’ on.”

“I know,” Din said.

“But can’t say I’m not a little bit in love with that kid.” Vanth stretched his legs out. “And I don’t want to see him fall into some sick, twisted bastard’s hands. I want to stay. Help if I can, if it comes to it.” He paused. “You saved my town  _ and  _ agreed to train me. Seems fair.”

Din frowned, but the relief filled him and he began to smile instead. He stroked the child’s back, more content than he had been before, assured that he had little to hide.

“What is there to do about it?” Vanth asked. “It changes things.”

“Keeping low,” Din said, and he began to get up. “Gideon is alive, but hasn’t been sending hunters after us like he did before. There must not be an active fob on him. Sorgan is a backwater planet like Tatooine — friends, there. Plenty of space. We can continue training you. Kid’s got friends he left behind.”

Vanth smiled. “Sounds nice.”

“Rest,” Din said. He began to climb the ladder again. “Sorgan will take a few hours and be on a different cycle. It’ll be their morning when we arrive.”

“Aye, captain,” Vanth said as he got up.

As Din climbed up, he cradled the child against his shoulder. The baby cooed and squirmed to get comfortable. He settled into the cockpit, looking into the light of hyperspace, and adjusted the seat back as he wrapped both arms around the kid. His eyes fell shut and the baby cooed, snuggling in.

His heart began to calm, and he soon drifted towards sleep.

Sleep would not come.

Cobb stretched out in his hammock for as long as he could stand it, but the state of restful unconsciousness refused to come. The cockpit was quiet, and when he crept up to look, Mando and the kid were fast asleep together at the controls. He trusted that the ship was on some sort of autopilot, or maybe hyperspace  _ was  _ autopilot—

He mentally filed away a reminder to ask about learning to fly the Crest. Seemed a good skill.

The promise of a new planet — one with  _ ponds,  _ as Mando had said, and he assumed that meant  _ water  _ — instilled a level of excitement and anticipation that left him feeling like a child in his giddiness. He paced the cargo hold, stretched, took off his cuirass and jetpack to let himself relax. The hold was too small to run to exhaust himself. Taking apart his carbine to clean it out didn’t take enough time.

As a kid in Mos Espa, his tracker’s leash had extended just beyond the walls, leaving the entire city as a playground so long as you could skirt the edge of real trouble. He and his friends had run about, finding any method of entertainment. Being transferred to Mos Pelgo had lost his friends and the excitement, but there was no leash where the brutal desert was incentive enough to stay close. There was plenty of space to climb rooftops and dunes, energy spend in the mines, sleep coming easy.

He wondered if the Mandalorian ever felt this restless on his ship.

The hours passed eventually, even if the boredom was mind-numbing. He climbed up into the cockpit and quietly settled into one of the co-pilot’s seats, eyelids heavy but his body still far too awake. Mando and the kid were still asleep, the baby tucked into his shoulder, and as Cobb sat, there came a soft whine and sleepy eyes opened. The baby looked over Mando’s shoulder at Cobb, blinking, and squirmed. Another whine escaped.

A quiet breath left the Mandalorian and the hand on the child’s back tightened, fingers gently digging in. The baby’s eyes shut again and he nuzzled his face against Mando’s cape.

Cobb smiled to himself. It almost seemed impossible that these two had started the way they had. The kid loved Mando, and Mando may have been a solitary person but it was clear he melted for the baby. Cobb leaned back against the seat, watching the lights of hyperspace, before an alarm overheard began to sound. He tensed up, unsure, until Mando jerked in the seat.

He sat up, helmet turning as he looked around, then reached up to switch off the alarm. He let out a tired breath and the kid whimpered as he was settled down in Mando’s lap. Mando grabbed the controls. “Hold on,” he muttered, and Cobb was quick to throw his seatbelt on. “Exiting…”

All at once, the stars stopping streaking. Cobb hissed as the ship jerked back, hopping out of hyperspace, and Mando glanced back at him as a green and blue planet loomed in front of them. Quickly recovering, Cobb’s eyes widened and he leaned forward to look.

“Sorgan,” Mando said. The kid began to babble away. “With no tracking fobs, it’s a perfect place to hide out.”

“That blue,” Cobb whispered. “That’s water?”

“Yes,” Mando said. “There’s plenty of water here.”

Cobb watched with wide eyes as they began to approach. Clouds swirled over the planet, thick in covering certain areas of land, and they broke the atmosphere. Mando straightened up, tilting his head to one side and then the other to crack his neck, and the baby stood in his lap to peer out the transparisteel. Mando looked back at Cobb.

“Stay strapped in,” he said. Cobb nodded.

As they approached, Mando pulled up coordinates on the screen, numbers that surely made far more sense to a computer than him. He watched as they began to soar over miles upon miles of green foliage, passing above massive clearings with ponds and lakes below. The water sparkled with the sun, some with tiny blips of colored animals while others could be small, scattered ponds. He had never seen so much natural green before. 

“It’s storming where we want to be,” Mando said.

The sky was beautiful as the sun began to rise this side of the planet, but as they continued to fly, grey clouds were ahead. He’d seen plenty of grey skies on Nevarro, but these clouds were darker than those, almost angry. Mando lowered the ship closer to the ground and as they flew into the murkiness, water began to  _ pelt  _ the ship. Cobb tensed.

“That’s…”

The rain rolled down the transparisteel, but the baby whined at the noise. In the distance, there was a  _ flash,  _ but before Cobb could look it was already gone. “What was that?” he demanded, almost standing before remembering he still had the seatbelt on.

“Lightning,” Mando said. “We’ll be down before it comes around again.”

“Comes around?”

Mando didn’t answer. The ship slowed, further and further, until they hovered above one spot. They lowered down, the ship giving sounds of strained groans as the landing cycle began, and it soon settled against the ground with a  _ thud.  _ Mando drew in a breath at the landing, but Cobb was too busy staring out the transparisteel at the pouring rain. The sky was dark and the rain did not let up, splattering against the clear shielding.

“The village is ahead,” Mando said, and he turned off the engines. He flipped a few switches before beginning to get up, the kid cradled in his arms. Cobb got up, too. Mando glanced at him, “We’ll wait out the rain in he—”

From high above, there was a  _ boom,  _ and Cobb nearly jumped. His hand flew to his blaster on instinct, and the kid let out a whimper. But Mando didn’t flinch, and instead he chuckled, a soft sound that… put Cobb at ease. He slowly released his blaster as Mando stepped towards the ladder. “Just thunder,” the Mandalorian said. “Not always that loud. This storm is bad.”

“Can we go out?” Cobb asked.

Mando glanced back at him, then climbed down into the cargo hold. “Wait for it to get lighter,” he said. “It’s more pleasant, then.”

Cobb frowned and crouched by the ladder, watching them walk to the galley. He stood again and looked towards the shielding before beginning to walk back to it. His jetpack came off and settled on the floor. He turned Mando’s chair and sank into it, eyes glued to the splatterings of rain against the front of the ship, and turned fully to face it. The rain was loud even through the ship’s walls and there was another flash across the sky that was just beyond his sight. Wind howled and the…  _ trees  _ swayed with it, loose leaves blowing about.

The sound was… something.

Soon, the sound had lulled him to sleep.

By the time the rain lightened to an occasional drizzle, the sky cloudy but bright, the kid was itching to escape the ship. Din threw on the satchel and eased the child into it, who reluctantly accepted that the restrictive bag meant travel. The village was just on the other side of the line of trees, a short walk away, but he stood on the ramp and spied the deep puddles.

From the cockpit, Vanth climbed down in a messy state of post-nap. His eyes squeezed shut for a moment and he rubbed at the corners, hair falling in his view until he brushed it back. “Goin’?” he said, reaching back to be sure the jetpack was settled properly.

Din nodded.

Vanth grabbed his helmet and flipped it up, letting it settle in place, before following. They began down the ramp, boots thumping against the metal, only for Vanth’s to suddenly stop. Din stepped off onto the ground, boot sinking into a puddle, and he looked back at Vanth who stood in place.

“Really just falls from the sky, huh?” he said.

Din stared at him, then began to smile. He took another step, both boots stirring through the water, until the ground raised and he stood on a patch of grass. Water still dripped from the trees and sprinkled from the sky, a warm breeze blowing. Sticks and small branches with leaves attached had fallen. But it seemed the storm had passed and through to the village, he could see the farmers walking about.

“It really does,” Din said.

Vanth looked at him, then took off his helmet and began to follow. As a foot and then two sank into the water, he looked around, breathing in the scent of just after a storm. The rain and the grass mixed together, the atmosphere still feeling like the storm had come through. Din began to walk, splashing through puddles, and Vanth followed. They passed trees and Vanth paused, letting his fingers run against the bark. He looked up at the leaves and reached up to pluck one off.

“Feel like I dreamed ‘bout this sorta thing,” he muttered, turning the leaf over. His thumb poked through the thin material with ease and his brows furrowed at the delicateness.

Din watched him and smiled. He forced it back, just as he forced back the odd urge to just… take the man’s hand. To pull him along, even as fond as he was of seeing Vanth discover things he’d never gotten to see before. Leaves and rain had never been so fascinating for Din, but now they seemed… special.

_ “Mando!” _

The peace didn’t last long. From the village came a small, running figure, splashing through the puddles. A few more followed just behind. The kid began to squirm in his bag and Winta had a wild grin on her face as the water sprayed up from beneath her feet. She was giggling as she ran, and Din barely turned before she ran straight into him, arms thrown around his waist in a hug.

“You’re back!”

Her squeeze was tight but it quickly disappeared as the baby cooed, her attention shifting down to him. “Hey buddy!” she giggled, and Din brought the bag forward, propped on his thigh so Winta could take him out. “I  _ miiiissed  _ you!” She squeezed him in a hug and the kid made delighted squeaks. The other children caught up behind her with their own grins, splashing about, and Din set a hand on his belt.

“He missed you, too,” he said in a quiet voice.

“Are you staying?” Winta asked, her own voice soft as she looked up at him.

“If we’re allowed,” Din said.

“Of  _ course  _ you are!” she said, voice almost offended at the implication he could ever  _ not  _ be welcome. She barely glanced at Vanth, reaching out to grab Din’s hand and pull with a boldness that must have come with her getting older. “Come on!”

Din resisted the urge to chuckle and instead looked back at Vanth to be sure he followed. The marshal had a slight smile on his face and followed just a foot or two behind, all their feet splashing in the puddles as they approached the village. The adults had spread all over the place, clearing any debris from the ponds or anything that had fallen. As they approached, the kids shouting for their parents,  _ Mando is back,  _ the adults began to turn.

“They sure know you,” Vanth said, a tone of amusement in his voice.

“Cara and I helped defend them from raiders,” Din said. Vanth’s smile fell, only slightly, and he looked past Din towards the village. Din’s brows furrowed but he brushed it off as they walked past the ponds.

“Mama!” Winta shouted. “Mama, Mando is here!”

The other villagers began to come near, smiles on their faces. Din turned, eyes searching, and while Winta babbled away he only looked for one person. It took a moment, but he looked ahead and locked his gaze with Omera. She stood amongst the others, looking at him with a smile, and something about it relaxed him. The voices of the excited kids, the baby’s contented trills, the ground beneath his feet, all felt comforting and safe and familiar.

Omera stepped forward. “Hi,” he said, looking down at her.

“Hi,” she said with a smile. “Welcome back.”

“Thank you.”

“Have you eaten?”

Settling in did not take long. Omera and others were quick to clear out the barn, now placing an extra bed inside. The roof would not support the weight of a hammock, and Vanth didn’t seem to mind having a real bed again. The baby could have his crib again, padded and comfortable with blankets, although he had no interest in it over his friends. He had no intention on leaving the other children just yet, and in fact—

Din settled the last crate of belongings on the bed and walked to the door of the barn. The rain had stopped and then started again, no monsoon but coming down. A few villagers ran past with blankets thrown up over their heads for cover and Din stepped into the rain as he set off towards the eating hut. The building itself was new, the largest in the village and where they prepared and ate food. Inside, he could hear voices, and brushed aside the curtain to step inside.

It was warm here from the ovens. A few adults were gathered around, cooking or chatting at the tables with the older children helping, the smell of food making Din’s mouth water. His attention was drawn to the side, where some of the other children gathered — and where Vanth was effectively trapped. He sat in one chair, the kid pointedly settled and snuggled against his middle. His helmet rested on the floor and the kids were sitting on the floor around him.

“You’re not a  _ real  _ Mandalorian?” a boy asked, a note of disappointment in his tone.

Vanth looked at him and his mouth twitched in a smile. “Not  _ yet,”  _ he said. “I’m trying to become one.” His eyes darted up to Din, then, and he sat up with a wider smile before letting his eyes drop back to the kids.

“You’ve really never seen  _ rain?”  _ a girl demanded, with a tone suggesting that she didn’t believe it in the slightest, and Din smiled before walking to the tables. He’d been given a similar treatment of questions. Those kids would keep Vanth in place for questioning for as long as they had the attention span, and Din wasn’t sure he would actually be able to tell them no.

He spotted Omera among those at the stoves, Winta helping beside her, but as Din came to the tables she turned and saw him. She smiled, then turned and said something to the woman, Latna, beside her. She wiped her hands off on her apron and walked over. “Settled in?” she asked with a smile.

“Yes, thank you,” Din said.

She touched the table top, then sat into one of the chairs, and Din took the other while both faced in. “Your boy seems well,” she said, her voice warm, looking past him towards Vanth and the kids. Din looked back and the baby looked like he was beginning to snooze. “When you left, you seemed determined to find a place for him.”

“I’m searching for his kind,” Din said. He hesitated, but the question came anyway. “Have you… ever heard of a  _ jedi?” _

Omera’s brows furrowed and she leaned her cheek into her hand, knuckle brushing against her lip. Her eyes darted to the table, then back to him, and she shook her head. “If I have, I don’t recall it,” she said.

Din sighed. “No one does,” he said.

“What brings you back here now?”

“The kid is still being hunted,” Din said. Omera frowned with concern and her hand settled down near Din’s. He glanced at it, shifting in his seat. “I thought I had killed the one who wanted him, but he still lives. I don’t have leads for the child. I don’t want to intrude on your people, but no hunters follow us and if you would be willing…”

“Of course,” Omera said, her tone gentle. She leaned to look past him, eyes shifting to Vanth. “Who’s your friend?”

Din turned again to look. In the same instance, Vanth’s gaze seemed to jerk away from him, back to one of the kids. Din frowned to himself, wondering if he were overthinking it, then turned back to Omera. “He’s from Tatooine,” he said. “He’s marshal of a settlement. I’m training him to be a Mandalorian so he can protect them better.”

“That’s kind of you,” Omera said, smiling.

Din looked at her and for a moment, didn’t move at all, then throwing his gaze back down towards his hand on the table. The rain continued to pound against the roof and he drew in a breath. He had anticipated… something. The same spark he felt for her was different now. Her smile still put him at ease, but he didn’t quite feel the same urge to be close, to take her hand, to…

This was not the distraction he’d hoped for.

But she reached out and took his hand. He almost stiffened, but made no effort to pull away, and her touch was gentle. “We owe you,” she said. “You, your boy, and your friend are welcome here as long as you need.”

Din curled his fingers around her hand. He had always wanted to do this, far too nervous in the past to be the one who reached out. But no, he thought as he released a breath, it was  _ different.  _ The same feelings weren’t there. Perhaps it had been… only a crush.

Then surely his crush on Vanth should fade as well.

A villager called Omera’s name and she gave Din another smile before she got up, returning to the others. He let out a breath and closed his eyes, realigning himself before the chair scraped again. Din looked up as Vanth sank into the seat with a sigh, setting down his helmet on the table and the baby tucked in his arm. The kid cooed and reached for Din.

“Lotta questions,” Vanth said with an amused breath. “Just leads into more.”

“I’m sure a desert planet seems impossible, compared to a place like this,” Din said. “They’ll rope as many stories out of you as they can.”

The kid was squirmy, becoming irritable with clear hunger as he lightly gnawed on Din’s thumb. Lunch came soon, though, the kids swiping plates of food first before they began to eat together. Din and Vanth took theirs with quiet thanks. The baby’s portion was piled onto Din’s, leaving it heavier. “I’m going back to the barn,” he muttered.

“Can I still eat with ya?” Vanth asked. It came hasty and spit-out, and Din looked back at him. The marshal reached out and grabbed his helmet off the table. “Back to back — can’t see, then.”

Din paused, then nodded. “If you want to,” he said.

Vanth nodded back and slipped his helmet on. Shifting the plate into the hand of his arm holding the child, Din pulled his cape over to shield the plate from the rain, walking out of the hut. It had lightened somewhat. Vanth walked at his side, both heading across the village to the barn, where they stepped inside. 

As they entered the barn, Din let go of his cape and let it fall back into place. The kid was already scrabbling for the meat and Din shifted it into his other hand. Vanth came in behind him and they began to settle on the floor, Din facing the back of the barn while Vanth turned towards the door. The rain was lightening more outside and Din settled with his legs crossed. He placed the plate and child both down, then removed his helmet, both his and Vanth’s making small  _ thums  _ as they were placed on the floor. The baby whined and reached for the pile of meat.

“No,” Din muttered. “Manners.”

The kid grumbled. But as Din scooped up meat on a fork, the kid sat back and opened his mouth, taking the big bite of it. He swallowed it down and Din took his own bite — it was the meat of an animal native to the planet that he couldn’t recall the name of. He remembered that they often hunted it through setting traps, and Caben had been excited about learning to hunt with a gun.  _ So much faster. _

He had missed this place.

“If Gideon  _ does  _ come after the kid,” Vanth said. “What’d we be facing?”

The  _ we  _ didn’t slip past Din’s notice and he took a deep breath, feeding the kid another forkful of meat. “I don’t know for certain,” he said. “Last time, he had a TIE fighter and a whole platoon. Some death troopers. But that base on Nevarro had more.” He took a bite of krill and chewed, swallowing. “... I can’t say.”

Vanth made a hum of affirmation. They settled into silence, the only sounds between them that of their forks scraping the plates or the kid’s absentminded growls as he ate and the rain overhead. “Enough for you?” Din asked as they finished off the plate, and the kid looked up at him. Din nodded and reached for his helmet, picking it up.

“You sound different without the helmet,” Vanth said.

Din froze, eyes darting down to the floor beside him. For a moment, he didn’t move. “Different,” he said.

“Nicer,” Vanth said. His own voice sounded… soft and gentle. “Less robotic, I mean. It’s… more you.”

Din’s face heated. He gripped his helmet tighter, urged to… keep it off. His heart pounded at the thought that Vanth  _ liked  _ his real voice. The kid began to climb into his lap and the feeling brought him out of his thoughts, slipping it back on.

“Thanks,” he said, voice coming filtered again.

If Vanth had disappointment in his eyes when he looked back at Din, Din was sure he was just imagining it. “I’ll take them back,” he said, grabbing his plate. He eased the kid back out of his lap and stood. “Keep an eye on him?”

Vanth nodded. He handed the plate over, then beckoned the kid over. “Lookin’ tired, buddy,” he said with a smile, and the kid blinked at him with heavy eyelids. “Didn’t you just nap?”

Din smiled to himself and stepped out of the barn as the skies began to clear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter written in the midst of... definite sickness, possibly for a second round of Rona. Awaiting a COVID test, but my respiratory system has definitely turned against me here. I go sleep now.
> 
> TY guys, you've all been lovely <3
> 
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	9. Krill Ponds and Close Calls

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Din and Vanth begin life on Sorgan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back! Thanks to [thetamehistorian](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thetamehistorian/pseuds/thetamehistorian) for looking over this chapter for me. Much love.
> 
> Thank yall for the well wishes on last chapter. Covid + pneumonia ended with a few hospital visits but I'm recovering and writing again. <3
> 
> New Sands of Time [discord](https://discord.gg/zEwyCKqrcB)  
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> [Twitter](https://twitter.com/coffee_quill)

After the storm came the sun. The next day was bright and beautiful with few white clouds in sight, warm but not overpowering, and Din didn’t have much desire to do anything other than savor it. He didn’t hear Vanth get up, either. They allowed themselves to sleep in, individually deciding that the sun had no say, until it was the baby’s whines that stirred them.

“Hey,” came Vanth’s soft voice, but the kid only whimpered again and claws scrabbled against the side of Din’s bed. Din was slow to move, eyes blinking open and exhausted, but the curtain that hung in front of him was moving and he looked down at the baby staring back up from the floor.

Din let his cheek rest against the edge of the bed frame, a hand dropping down to touch the child’s back. He stroked his ears. On the other side of the curtain, he could hear Vanth get up — and a few satisfying  _ pops.  _ The child’s ears swiveled, but his eyes stayed on Din, lifting his arms higher with a whimper.

Din scooped him up and turned onto his back with a sigh, letting the boy rest on his chest. “Morning,  _ ad’ika,” _ he whispered, and the baby smiled before reaching out to press his hands against Din’s cheeks. Din shut his eyes at the sensation, smiling at the light pats he received.

“What’s today?” Vanth asked.

Din opened his eyes and looked up at the ceiling. The baby whined again to bring his attention back and Din shifted to sit up further, letting the child rest forward on his chest. “We’ll… continue with sparring,” he said. “But just review what we’ve done. Not pushing it.”

He grabbed his helmet and slipped it on, shifting the child into his arms before he pushed the curtain aside. Vanth sat on his bed, tugging his vest down into place, and glanced at Din before quickly grabbing his bandana and slipping it around his neck. He tied it off and reached for his boots. “You said you helped defend this place,” he said. “Town seems to love you.”

“I did,” Din said.

“In the business of protectin’  _ every  _ small town? Thought we were special.”

Din glanced at him and Vanth grinned, an infectious gesture, and Din grabbed the extra blanket off his bed to throw at him. Vanth threw a hand up to catch it and Din took his vambraces to clip on. “That’s  _ your _ job, isn’t it?” he said. “Let’s go.”

Both dressed and walked out of the barn into the sunlight, the kid happily toddling after them. The villagers were already well at work, climbing in and out of the ponds with baskets full of jumping krill, a droid with more baskets stepping through the water. Some kids gathered in the center to play while others — including Winta, Din realized — were at the ponds to help. He then spotted Omera handing Winta a basket, waist-deep in water, and began to walk over. Vanth followed along, holding his helmet beneath his arm, and Din stopped at the edge of the pond.

“Mando!” Winta said with a grin.

Omera turned in the water, squinting against the sun as she looked up at him, and smiled. “Late morning,” she said, and took the basket back from Winta. “How did you both sleep?”

“Fine,” Din said. He glanced at Vanth, who nodded. The child cooed as he caught up with them and Din bent down to scoop him into his arms, away from the water’s edge.

“There’s food in the hut, still,” Omera said, looking up at them again. She looked down and eased the basket into the water, slow in dragging it across and gathering the krill, and Din watched the motion. “We’ll have lunch soon, though.”

“Thank you,” Din said with a nod. Winta gave them a bright smile as they turned away, walking back towards the village, and the child whined as he patted at Din’s chest. “I know. You’re hungry.”

The food hut had little in the way of leftovers, and the few villagers within it were more focused on preparing lunch. Din and Vanth swiped a plate of what was left, not minding that it was cold, and both Vanth and the kid ate as they walked out towards the fields. Din was fine to slip a slice of meat beneath his helmet, nudging it a little bit upwards to reach his mouth.

“How much experience do you have with guns?” he asked, swallowing.

“I don’t miss,” Vanth said.

A cocky statement Din would be happy to test later. “I mean, in variety,” he said. “You shoot a pistol and a carbine. Anything long-range, explosive…”

“Just those two, though I think I could work my way around something else.”

Din nodded. As they stopped in the open field, he settled the kid down on a patch of grass and dropped to stretch. Vanth eased down into a stretch of his own, eyes drawn towards the trees and then ponds. A cool breeze went past that rustled his hair, blowing a lock into his eyes that he brushed back, and Din cast his eyes away. The helmet was a nice guise for his new habit of staring, but Vanth wasn’t blind. He’d  _ notice. _

_ Get it together. _

They took their time in stretching, no interest in pulling anything, and soon were on their feet again. Vanth slipped his helmet on and rolled his shoulders with weight shifting between the balls of his feet. Din rolled his wrists and stood across from him.

The baby cooed.

Vanth lunged first. He was quick but drew in a breath, arm cocking back just enough to broadcast the punch, and Din sidestepped with ease. He grabbed Vanth’s upper arm and pulled him down, knee coming up to land in his gut, and Vanth groaned as he bent over in pain. Din brought his knee up again and kicked into his side, sending Vanth sprawling into the grass. Vanth caught himself and winced, pushing back up.

“... Warming up,” he said.

“If you say so.”

Vanth huffed. He brushed dirt off his pant leg and was back up again. They took a few steps to circle, just out of each others’ reach, and Din let his guard lower. “You have the armor,” he said. “You can block with the beskar. Use it.”

Vanth nodded. For a moment, he looked as though he would charge in, but thought better of it. Instead he waited, letting his guards lower as well, and Din eyed him. Cara liked to pull that trap — feigning lack of defense, drawing the other in to attack. He wondered how much Vanth had picked up from her.

He’d take the bait.

He lunged in with a punch. Vanth reacted just as fast. He ducked to the inside and shoved Din’s arm aside, grabbing his wrist, as he twisted and drove his elbow into Din’s throat. Din bent forward with a sputtering gasp, free hand flying to his neck, as Vanth pulled him into a knee strike that sent more air out of him. Tears jumped to Din’s eyes and he blinked them away.

Vanth lifted his knee a second time but Din grabbed his calf, shoving his foot in behind Vanth’s, and pushed. They tumbled to the ground with pained grunts and Vanth was quick to shove his heel against Din, trying to squirm free. Din winced but tightened his grip — taking only a second before tugging Vanth closer and scrambling on top of him. It took a second to register that Vanth’s helmet had come off, and hazel eyes stared up at him, hair a flattened mess.

_ “Shit,”  _ Vanth breathed.

Adrenaline pumped and Din seized one wrist, pinning it to the dirt, while Vanth grabbed at his. Vanth’s expression morphed with effort but Din twisted his wrist free, grabbing Vanth’s forearm to slam it down into the dirt. The marshal stared up at him, wide-eyed and chest heaving, and  _ dear fucking Maker. _

His grip slackened.

Then, Vanth was pressing on his vambrace controls, and the armor let out a  _ chirp  _ before he was sent flying.

Din near yelped, hand shooting to his vambrace as he tried to right himself mid-air, but he was too slow. He landed on his feet but tumbled backwards, hissing as he came to a rough stop, body thrown off by the impact. He pushed up onto his hands and knees, looking up as Vanth got up and reached for his helmet—

He shot his arm out and his whipcord fired,  _ zipping  _ as it wrapped around Vanth’s arm. He pulled and Vanth hissed, jerked towards him and away from the helmet. Din dragged him closer. Vanth pulled back, trying to dig his heels in, until his other arm snapped up and the blades extended. He slashed through the wire and both stumbled backwards, barely keeping their feet. Din closed the distance and swung in another punch, this time blocked by a gauntlet, as Vanth kept stepping back to put space between them.

His heart pounded.

He could see the switch, the split second that Vanth shifted his weight  _ forward,  _ blocking down another punch before throwing his own. Din caught his fist, no lack of pain at the impact, and stepped in close to Vanth’s space. His other hand grabbed his waist, fingers digging into his shirt, and he  _ intended  _ a sweep and takedown. Instead, they crashed together and Vanth hissed in pain, free hand grabbing at Din’s shoulder, then at his face. Din froze.

“Hey, hey.”

Vanth was tense, watering eyes darting up to him and grabbing at his hand to fight back. But Din didn’t make a move, instead straightening up, and without further thought he’d grabbed Vanth by both the waist and his arm almost tenderly. Vanth stared at him, returning his hand to touch gently at his nose with a wince. The cast still sat in place but the pain was clear.

“You alright?”

“Just hurt…”

“Sorry.”

“You didn’t—“

The child made a shriek to draw their attention. They both looked over, but the baby’s eyes were locked on a nearby frog. Din let out a sigh, leaning his weight onto one hip, and Vanth had a smile. They looked back at each other — but a cold feeling came over Din, and Vanth’s expression fell into nervous, as both realized the position they stood in.

They quickly stepped back. Vanth’s face flushed red and Din felt the same. He brought a hand to rub at his throat and walked over to the child, watching as he toddled towards the frog. His stomach twisted about in place, adrenaline still pumping though his veins, now being tempered by his own…

His own stupidity.

He could hear Vanth’s footsteps as he collected his helmet. His stomach still fluttered with both nerves and anxiety, fear that they’d just pushed a boundary they shouldn’t touch. The footsteps stopped behind him, still a bit distanced, and both watched as the kid crouched behind a clump of grass. The frog hopped near and croaked, completely still.

“Aah!”

The baby jumped at the frog, much like Din had seen the very first time, and threw himself onto the creature. Vanth chuckled, a warm sound even as it was coming through the modulator, but one that stopped as the kid began to  _ swallow  _ the frog—

“Oh.”

“That takes care of lunch,” Din sighed. The kid swallowed the frog down and it disappeared with a smile, turning to look up at Din and Vanth with a coo. He wandered over and lifted his arms to Din, who bent down to pick him up. “That’s still disgusting.”

The baby giggled.

With no further comment, they began back towards the village, and neither looked at the other. Din felt…  _ guilt  _ creep into his system. Vanth wore the helmet now, hiding his face, but surely a faceful of beskar was going to leave a mark. He thought of Vanth, lying bloody on the street beneath a Trandoshan, battered and bruised and the rage Din had felt at the sight—

He knew full well that injuries were simply part of training. How many broken arms, wrists, fingers, and more had he suffered during his training as a boy? They happened, and healed, stronger for it. You learned to protect yourself better so it wouldn’t happen again. But no part of him had any desire at all to hurt Cobb, even in the context of sparring.  _ This was supposed to be light, anyway.  _

He needed to draw his thoughts back in before they consumed him.

“Nice job, with the jetpack,” he said.

“You said to use the armor,” Vanth said. “Guessed it didn’t have to be  _ mine.” _

There was an air of humor to his voice, and Din hoped the friendliness meant he wasn’t repulsed by their earlier position. He’d pulled away just as fast, Din remembered, even if…  _ well, he’d let me do it.  _

Did that even mean anything?

Or did he just want it to?

“Clever,” he said.

“How’d it go?”

Both stopped and looked down, and Din realized they were passing Omera and Winta’s pond. The girl was paying no attention to them, a look of concentration on her face and tongue poking out of the corner of her mouth. She held an empty basket and was slow to drag it through the water around her, moving in a standstill circle, until it came up full of krill.

“Very good,” Omera praised with a smile.

“It went fine,” Din said, watching as they emptied the basket into a barrel.

“How does this work?” Vanth asked.

“It’s our harvest time,” Omera said, looking up. “The krill population in each pond is at its highest after mating season, so we harvest them now for spotchka.”

“We catch ‘em with these!” Winta supplied, holding her basket up where a few krill still flopped about. “Have to be slow, though, so they don’t get scared.”

“Krill,” Vanth muttered. He bent down to one knee to look at the basket’s minimal contents, reaching in to brush his knuckle against one. It bounced away. “You make spotchka? Here?”

“Yes.” Omera smiled. “Their glow gives the same element to spotchka. We keep plenty of batches for ourselves, but we sell most to the town.”

“Huh,” Vanth said, sounding fascinated.

“Do you want to try it?”

“Uh…” Vanth stood up and shook his head. “Better not to mess up your harvest.”

“A few missed baskets won’t hurt,” Omera said with a smile, and she began to climb out of the pond. “Winta can show you.”

Vanth hesitated. But he reached up and took his helmet off, setting it on the ground before he sat at the edge, dipping his feet into the pond. He was slow to ease in, watching the water rise up on his legs until he was submerged up to his thighs. At first he stared down at the water like it was a massiff about to bite him. But he cautiously took a step, and his eyebrows raised from hesitation to almost wonder, and lowered his hands into the water. He dragged it through and watched the ripples, a grin coming onto his face, before glancing at Din.

Din flexed his hands at his sides, drawing in a breath.

“Here.” Winta held out her basket and Vanth took it. She then grabbed another off from the side and smiled. “You can do it fast, sometimes, but they’re quick so you could  _ scare  _ them and you’ll have to wait. But if you’re  _ slow…” _

She eased the basket down into the water. Like before, she dragged it around her, and then quickly scooped it up. The krill flailed about, but the basket was filled a decent amount. She wore a grin and as Din glanced at Omera, who watched Winta with a smile and expression of pride, he felt similar. No, he didn’t think of Winta as a daughter — that didn’t feel…  _ right  _ for him to think. But she was clearly older than he’d last seen her, and already good at farming. He felt a little bit of pride, too.

Vanth watched Winta, then looked down at the water and for a moment, hesitated, as though just putting the basket in the water wrong would scare every krill away. He looked up at Din. “Would water hurt the armor?”

“No.”

His mouth twitched slightly but he eased the basket into the pond. He let it sink in, then slowly and carefully, brought it around him in an arc. As it reached his other side, he flipped it up and looked down at the few krill inside. He frowned.

“Just like that!” Winta supplied, just as bubbly.

“Ain’t much…”

“Then there just weren’t a lot around you.” Winta shrugged. “Happens.”

Omera held her hands out and Vanth handed over the basket for the krill to be dumped into the barrel. The baby cooed and squirmed in Din’s arms, reaching towards Vanth, who smiled at him. She gave it back and he looked down at the water for a second time, then dipped the basket in, this time holding it deeper until it came up to his elbows. He pulled the basket back up quickly, now with more krill floundering in it.

“There you go,” Omera said with a smile.

Vanth grinned, then handed the basket over. For a moment, he glanced at Din, and again Din felt a warm pride. But Vanth’s eyes quickly darted away, back down to the water, and Din felt his stomach drop. He turned to the back end of the pond and pushed himself up, climbing out with a soaked bottom half.

“You don’t know how to swim,” Din burst out.

Vanth paused, looking at him, then shook his head. He stepped around to reach for the helmet and picked it up. “Can’t.”

“You need to learn.” Din looked towards Omera. “Is there anything like a lake nearby?”

Omera sat back on her heels, hands in her lap, and she bit her lip slightly. “There’s one in that direction that the kids swim at,” she said, and pointed outwards. Din looked and could see a natural tunnel to the way the trees bent, the path hidden in the grass. “About a half-mile walk. They like to climb the rocks, fairly shallow at parts.”

“Shorter flight,” Din said. He turned and looked at Vanth. “Good recovery.”

Vanth looked at him, bending down to squeeze out some of the water from his pants, and nodded. “Sure,” he said.

They began towards the field. “Be back soon for lunch,” Omera called, and Din gave her a nod. But they left the ponds behind, Vanth walking just off his shoulder, until Din stopped and reached for his vambrace. They shot off into the sky, above the trees, wind whipping past them.

Cobb landed beside Mando with a slight stumble, quickly catching himself with a heel dug in the ground to brace. The Mandalorian’s landing was more graceful, taking a few quick steps before slowing to a walk, and for a moment it almost felt embarrassing. But Mando didn’t seem to notice, not even looking at Cobb and instead towards the lake they had landed near. As Cobb looked out at the water, his eyes widened, and he stared at the most water he’d ever seen in one place.

The lake was massive and the far shore seemed distant. The water was a clear and lovely blue, few small creatures floating about on the surface with little look given towards the newcomers. The dirt shore had a slow incline down into the water and Cobb took a few slow steps forwards it, stopping just at the water.

“How hard’s it to swim?”

“Not that difficult, but I learned as a child,” Mando said. The child was placed on the ground with a firm command to  _ stay here.  _ Mando reached back and took off his jetpack with a  _ hiss  _ and Cobb was slow to copy the movement. They set the jetpacks on a large, flat rock that poked out of the water and Mando stepped into the lake. It only came halfway up his boots, and as he took a few more steps, Cobb watched.

“Take it off,” Mando said. He turned and looked back at Cobb. “The armor. You don’t need the weight.”

Cobb stared at him, then slowly, began to take off the gauntlets. Their little incident during sparring had a firm hold on the front of his mind and not only because of how his nose still throbbed. It had been…  _ nice.  _ He’d gotten a few good licks in against a trained Mandalorian and that could speak a thousand words, at least in his mind, about how far he’d come. Mando  _ holding  _ him like that after the hit, being  _ concerned  _ and  _ apologetic  _ for hurting him, it’d… It had been perfect.

_ Shouldn’t have reacted.  _ He placed the vambrace on the rock with a little more force than necessary, a clean  _ ping _ coming back up at him, and he took a long, deep breath. But what good would that have done him? Mando didn’t… he’d gotten away from Cobb as fast as he could. Lucky he had a helmet on, or the disgusted look on his face would have torn Cobb to shreds a little harder.

When he finished taking off the armor, Mando had gone out into the water by a few feet, the water coming to his knees and then his waist. Cobb watched him, fairly hesitant. But Mando had no reservations about walking right in so Cobb followed with splashing footsteps. The lake felt cooler than the pond and he sucked in a breath as it quickly rose up his body, now  _ cold,  _ and he quickly backed up with a nervous laugh. “That’s freezing.”

“It’s cool,” Mando said, looking at him. Cobb dug his teeth into his lip, looking down at the water, but a breeze blew past and he shivered.  _ Fuck,  _ he thought. _ Sorgan  _ was cool, Nevarro had been warmer, but the water felt like ice… no, ice hurt. Ice  _ bit  _ him until he didn’t feel anything. This was somewhere in the middle, but closer to ice.

“That’s too cold,” Cobb muttered. “We can just…”

Mando let himself fall back, submerging in the water up to his shoulders, and Cobb watched him. His arms moved back and forth in the water in a fan-like motion that… really, looked ridiculous. But he didn’t  _ sink.  _ When Cobb didn’t move, he stood up again.

“Come on,” Mando said. His voice was soft.  _ Welcoming.  _ Almost the gentle teasing of a friend trying to goad him, as he glanced towards where the kid sat watching them. “You’ll get used to it.”

Cobb swallowed. Below his knees, where he was still submerged, he  _ was  _ starting to get used to the water — though he certainly didn’t like the feeling of waterlogged clothing. Slowly, he took a step forward again, and then another. The water rose higher and as it came up towards his waist, he shivered. “Fuck,” he whispered, lifting his arms to keep them dry, and it came up to his chest. “You sure this is…”

“Not that cold,” Mando said. “Just relax. You can stand here. Put your face in the water, breathe out through your nose. Just… feel it.”

Cobb looked at him, hesitating, but leaned down. The water was another cold shock to his face, and not  _ entirely  _ foreign — he’d put his face in water before to clean off. But being submerged as he did it was new, and as he ran out of air, he came back up. He gasped in a deep breath and wiped at his eyes.

“Still alive?” Mando teased.

“Heh. Alive.”

“Still feel okay?”

“Yes.”

“Go under,” Mando said. “Do the same, let out a whole breath. Just feel what the water’s like and come back up.”

_ That  _ knotted his stomach, but Cobb quickly pushed the feeling away. He could do it, he told himself again and again, there was no reason to be afraid. He took a deep breath and let himself drop down again, exhaling as he went. He had to bring his hands up in the water to push himself down, eyes squeezed shut, but the cool water surrounded him and it was… silent.

Almost completely silent.

It was nice. He released his breath slowly, taking in the feeling, the quiet and the stillness of being completely underwater. He’d only ever taken sponge baths in his life, water too precious of a commodity on Tatooine to waste on baths, or slaves. He could remember being a boy and pouring baths for his master, staring longingly at the water to just  _ feel  _ what a cool bath was like, only to be too afraid to risk it.

He’d missed out.

Until something bumped into his leg.

He gasped, inhaling far too much, and the peace of the moment was disturbed in an instant. He shot up from the water, coughing and sputtering at the flood of lake water into his lungs, and the burning sensation in his nostrils. “F-Fuck,” he gasped.

“Vanth?” Mando was right in front of him, hands lifted out of the water as though to grab him again, but he made no contact. From the shore, the baby whined.

“Something tou — touched…” He coughed again. “Touched my leg. Just… startled.”

Mando looked at him, then out into the water. He ducked down, submerging himself into the water with a splash, leaving only ripples behind as he disappeared, and Cobb looked down to watch the flash of silver that reflected the sun. He noticed the other small, colored shapes in the water, and Mando popped back up with a deep breath. “Just fish,” he said. “If the kids play here, they must be used to humans.”

“Just fish,” Cobb muttered. He brushed his hair back, wet locks falling in his eyes, and he coughed again as his lungs continued to burn. He drew in a breath. “Damn.”

“Do you want to keep going?” Mando asked.

“Give me a minute,” Cobb muttered. “Y’know. Never realized how much water  _ can  _ exist at once.”

“Must be hard to visualize when it’s not your reality,” Mando said. “This is… fairly small. A place like Kamino is covered in water, always storming.”

Cobb chuckled. “You could tell me  _ anythin’  _ and I’d have no reason not to believe you.”

“I wouldn’t lie to you,” Mando said.

Cobb’s smile faded, not with dislike but almost…  _ hope.  _ For a moment, he could almost let himself hope that those words meant something more. The attempt of letting his feelings go was… well, when Mando said things like that, it suddenly became a whole lot harder.  _ Maker,  _ he was in deep, and not just in water.

He’d adjusted to the water and now moved his hand back and forth across the surface. “You still want to do this?” Mando asked, and Cobb looked up. “This training. You still want it.”

“If I didn’t, I’d tell you,” Cobb said. “Promise that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Got desperate for a DinCobb place, so I made a Sands of Time [discord](https://discord.gg/zEwyCKqrcB)  
> [Tumblr](https://coffeequill.tumblr.com/)  
> [Twitter](https://twitter.com/coffee_quill)


	10. In the Depths

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Din talks to Omera. He and Vanth make a discovery about the suit of armor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Continuing on Sorgan.
> 
> TY to friends who joined the SoT discord, the conversations there have been super enlightening for helping me with this! And lovely thanks to thetamehistorian for letting me keep throwing chapters at her for beta help. 
> 
> [Tumblr](https://coffeequill.tumblr.com/)  
> [Twitter](https://twitter.com/coffee_quill)  
> Sands of Time [discord](https://discord.gg/zEwyCKqrcB)

“Hey. Stop.”

Din grumbled as the kid kept tugging at his hand, whines and whimpers escaping. He was exhausted and sore, feeling every hit Vanth had managed to land against him the day before, and the sky was barely beginning to lighten. He shoved his face into the pillow and turned away. But the little one was insistent, letting out a shriek before he began to try climbing over Din’s hip, claws scrabbling against his beskar. The crib didn’t mean much when the baby could escape it.

“Fine! Fine.”

The kid cooed again and watched as Din sat up, rubbing at his eyes. He grabbed the helmet and slipped it on. The baby began climbing up onto his thigh, finding himself a place to sit, and Din looked down at him as he strapped on his pauldrons, letting out a sigh.

“Breakfast, then.”

The kid trilled.

Din swept him up into his arms and shoved the curtain aside as he started towards the door. Vanth still slept in his bed, snoring away, and Din paused to look down at him. He slept on his back, drooling onto the pillow with hair in his eyes, and Din drew in a breath. He wore a blue cloth shirt made by the villagers that was just a little too big on him and the color felt like a clash against his usual dark red.

The kid’s mewl snapped him out of his thoughts, sending him out into the village.

They weren’t the only ones up. Caben and a few other men were moving barrels across the village and a few others sat together to talk. Din scanned the area for any familiar faces when a happy “Baby!” came from behind. Din turned and looked down at Winta, who came from behind with a smile on her face. “Morning.”

“Morning,” Din said. “Is there breakfast?”

“Mama and I are eating! You can come.”

Din hesitated. “I don’t want to interrupt.”

“You won’t! We got plenty.”

Winta skipped off towards the huts and Din looked down at the baby before following. The baby practically purred with satisfaction. They followed Winta past the other villagers until they came to one hut with a short awning, Winta stepping inside, and Din pausing another moment before he also ducked inside.

“Mama, Mando’s here!”

“What do you mea— oh, good morn—”

Din’s helmet struck the archway of the hut and he winced, dazed for only a second before recovering. “Are you alright?” Omera said quickly, and Din’s face flushed as he nodded. The hut was certainly large enough for just two people, beds at either end with a table in the center where Omera sat. A woven rug covered the wooden floor. Winta sat at the opposite side, and with no lack of embarrassment, Din eased down to sit on the table as well, settling the kid down beside him.

“I said he could eat with us,” Winta said, beginning to pick at her plate again.

“The kid is hungry,” Din said. “If you… don’t mind.”

Omera nodded and smiled. “Of course not,” she said, and leaned over to scrape a new plate of food off of a larger platter. “The marshal is still asleep?”

“Yes,” Din said.

“He’s nice,” Winta mumbled as she bit into more food. “I like him. Are you going to swim later?”

“Maybe,” Din said. “I’ll tell you if we are.”

Winta smiled at that and they settled into silence. It was… domestic. The kid ate eagerly from his hand and Winta and Omera made quiet talk about Winta’s friends as Din listened to their voices in silence. Months ago, he would have thought this almost intimate; how many times had he sat with Omera and felt his heart flutter the same way it had been doing since Tatooine? He looked at her, and she smiled at him.

He felt… nothing.

As the kids finished eating, Winta was more than happy to steal away the baby and escape the tent with him in tow. Omera fixed Din a plate and turned away to wipe down the dishes, letting him face away and eat in peace, instead humming a song whilst doing so. Her voice was soft and warm, nothing spectacular and lovely at the same time. As the sun continued to rise, Din looked out the doorway and watched the silhouettes of the villagers become recognizable figures, children and adults alike beginning the day. He watched Winta, kid in her arms, run to join the flock of children as they appeared.

“This place is the same,” Din said.

“Not much has changed,” Omera said.

Din took the last bite and set his helmet back on. He turned to look back at Omera, then turned his body, letting his boots drag against the floor. Omera turned at the sound and she smiled before taking his plate. “No, not much,” he agreed. “It’s nice.”

“We missed you.”

Din looked up at the words, whatever thought train he’d been on crashing all at once. “Missed me,” he said in a quiet voice. He felt his stomach fill with that sensation of butterflies and he looked at Omera, only — the fluttering wasn’t his unspoken feelings. Not like it had been before. When he had looked at her and saw a future he wanted but couldn’t have. Instead he knew them to be the flutterings of guilt, for feelings he couldn’t seem to revive.

Perhaps distance did not always make the heart grow fonder.

And the boy,” Omera said quickly with a breathy laugh. She looked back with heated cheeks like she’d realized how it could sound. He sat stock still. “Winta was so sad for so long. And Cara, too, of course. We all hoped you’d find a way back for a visit.”

“I wanted to come back,” Din said. “For a long time. I would… I’d dreamt about it. But they were after the child and now my quest is…”

“It’s more important than us,” she said. She set the plates away and came over, settling in front of him. She reached for his hand and her expression was nothing if not understanding. “I know, Mando. But you’re  _ always  _ welcome.”

Her hand was warm, and through his glove, he imagined it to be… rough. Rough with the labor of the ponds, rough from handling weapons in a past life he still wanted to ask about. He’d never known why she lived in a place like this but shot a blaster with a sense of comfort. Where the powerful gleam in her eye had come from when they faced the raiders and the rest of the village trembled in fear. She was still such an enigma to him and once upon a time he’d been silent about his longing to unravel it.

She looked at him with such kindness now. Outside, the children laughed, and he turned to see them run past. Din took a deep breath, and slowly, began to imagine the life he had once longed for.

He gripped her hand with determination, like it could give him his feelings back, like it was what he was meant to do.

The days were getting hotter and the storms seemed to increase with it. For the next two days, they sat mostly hunkered down in the barn, watching the water flood through the village. It was the middle of rain season and the villages had driven ‘shields’ into the ground around the ponds, wooden sheets to keep the krill from going everywhere, now working fast in the rain to harvest more krill before they dove back inside to dry off. All huddled in their homes, out of the rain.

“This is only part of the planet, too, right?” Vanth said. 

Din looked over, leaning back on his bed as Vanth sat by the door, watching the rain. He held Vanth’s helmet in his lap, slipping out a panel to check over the circuitry. He still couldn’t figure out how to turn the HUD on even as everything looked to be in place. The eyestalk worked fine when it was down. Everything else was simply through the visor itself. He frowned, occasionally glancing towards the child napped in his crib.

“The storm,” Vanth said. He fiddled with the vambrace in his lap, pressing on the unprogrammed controls. “Like when we flew in — the storm’s only over part of the planet, not all of it.”

“Right,” Din said. “Your sandstorms are like that.”

“Don’t get many in Mos Pelgo,” Vanth muttered. “Winds don’t hit us so strong.”

Din looked up at him, then closed up one panel to open another. “You said you grew up in Mos Espa,” he said.

“Born there,” Vanth said. “I had my mother. Lil’ sister — Sina. She was a few years younger than me. Lived there for a few good years, had friends.”

“How did you get to Mos Pelgo, then?”

Vanth was quiet for a moment. He turned and put his back to the wall beside the door, looking at Din, and even from a distance Din could see the tired, almost haunted expression on his face. “I was transferred,” Vanth said. “My… master sent me out to his business partner in the town. They owned the mines. I was old enough to start working.”

Din’s hands paused, but he looked back down towards the helmet to keep working. He felt no surprise at the explicit mention of enslavement. Vanth’s implications on Nevarro, and the seething hatred when seeing how the Mythrol was treated, had lent towards a background of such. The determination to protect the town, the adherence to law, made sense. “The Mining Collective…”

“My owner was the mayor,” Vanth said. He let out an amused breath. “Not  _ elected.  _ But he owned it all. The slaves worked with the Collective — they were hirees. It was… bad, but you found a balance, and…” he hesitated. “There were whispers when the rebellion started. Hopeful ones. At first it was hopeful, that there were people standing up to the Empire. Maker knows they were  _ against  _ slavery while letting it happen anyway. And then… hopeless, when it went on for so long. You tried to hold onto the thought that if they could exist for so long, they were doing somethin’  _ right _ out there.”

Din’s hands stopped.

“Towards the end — slaveholders were startin’ to think twice. My master was. The rebellion had killed one Death Star, surely they could kill another. And if the rebellion won out, if you had the little guys win the war and news spread…” he shifted. “He was gettin’ more and more nervous. Empire could fall, the krayt was still attacking when it got hungry, paranoia of losing control. When we got the news that the war was practically over, second Death Star gone, it…” he paused. “The Mining Collective saw their opportunity and took it.”

“They became the masters,” Din said.

“Killed mine,” Vanth said with a nod. “Took complete control in one swoop. Made the others do the mining and working while they got to relax.” He paused and shifted his feet. “I considered not going back. Just going to Mos Espa again, starting myself over, now a free man. But I felt guilt for ever considering abandoning my people.”

For a long moment, they sat in silence. Din felt his throat begin to ache with the desire to speak. To…  _ clarify,  _ perhaps, about the Mythrol. Vanth’s accusation began to bubble up in his mind, the raspy and hissed  _ you’re okay with this,  _ and his stomach twisted and palms sweated that well, if Vanth was trusting him with his story, surely he didn’t think  _ that  _ badly of Din and…

“I didn’t—” he started.

“I’ve been, uh—” Vanth began.

Both stopped and smiled. Din’s face heated beneath the helmet and he sat up with the helmet as Vanth shifted. “You can go,” the marshal said.

“N… No. It’s not important. You were saying?”

Vanth looked at him and then down to his hands. “... I dunno how to word this,” he muttered. “But, uh, I’ve been… starting to feel a bit—”

A loud whimper came from the crib and both looked over as the baby woke, teary eyes peering out towards Din. The kid let out a soft wail, beginning to cry, and both men froze before Din set the helmet aside. He came to the crib and reached down, pulling the kid up into his arms, and cradled him close. “Hey,” he murmured, running his thumb over his cheek. The kid whined and snuggled in as close as he could, hiding his face in the fabric of Din’s cape. “Hey…”

The baby was content to hide away in Din’s arms, curled in as much as possible before he settled in place. Din could feel the unsettledness of a nightmare and stroked his back with his fingers to calm him. As he settled back on the bed, leaning against the wall, they were quiet again. Vanth watched them with a slight smile and Din took a deep breath.

“You were starting to…”

“It’s not important,” Vanth said.

Din nodded and looked down at the child, gentle in stroking his ears. The boy’s breathing was evening out and Din began to feel relaxed as well. Vanth watched them, a smile on his face, until his attention shifted back to the vambrace. He turned it over, then pressed his thumb to the front of it. As the child squirmed, letting out a soft coo, Din shut his eyes.

“... Mando?”

Din opened his eyes again and frowned. Vanth held the gauntlet out in front of himself with an uncertain expression on his face, brows furrowed, and staring at the orange hologram projecting from the front of the vambrace. It took Din a moment, but as he pushed up off the bed and walked over, he recognized the small scrawls of Mando’a. He reached out and grabbed the gauntlet, lifting it higher.

“You can read that?” Vanth asked.

“It’s Mando’a,” Din muttered. “... It’s a chain code.”

The words jumped out at him and his eyes scanned over the code, almost… fascinated.  _ Boba Fett. Father Fett. Mentor Jaste. Concord Dawn.  _ The family tree sprawled itself out, back by what seemed to be three generations, though Fett was not a Mandalorian name he’d known. But it seemed the previous owner’s father had been a foundling, at least if he were reading the incomplete chain code right. The armor was inherited, which accounted for its weathered appearance.

For a moment, he almost felt a regretful twinge, that the passing down of armor had been broken by death.

“What’s it say?” Vanth asked.

“The last owner was named Boba Fett,” Din said. “This is legacy armor, by the looks of it. If their father was a foundling, he didn’t take his clan’s name.” He was never sure if that was rare. If it was an oddity to refer to himself, in his mind, as Din Djarin, not as Din  _ Forte  _ when he’d been found by his new clan—

Vanth’s expression drew him out of his thoughts. “Are you okay?” Din demanded.

Vanth had gone pale and now let out a nervous laugh. He shoved himself up to his feet and put his hands on his waist, stepping around in a small circle as he let out a breath. “This,” he said, pointing to his chest, “is Boba Fett’s armor.”

The baby shifted. Din ran his thumb over his back and slowly lowered the gauntlet. “... You know it comes from  _ someone,  _ right?”

Vanth stopped in place and stared at Din like he’d spontaneously grown a second head, eyes wide and disbelieving. “Mando,” he said in a quieter voice. “This is…  _ Boba. Fett’s. Armor.  _ Do you…  _ not…” _

“You know him?”

“You’re a  _ bounty hunter!  _ How do you not—” Vanth let out a shaky breath and turned away, running his hand over his mouth instead. He took a step, then turned back to Din, and with the wild look in his eyes Din almost felt the urge to grab and reassure him. “Boba Fett. He was a bounty hunter. A  _ feared  _ hunter. His targets never escape. He worked for the  _ Empire,  _ for Jabba, he  _ never  _ failed them and was the most successful hunter you’d ever hear of.” Vanth swallowed. “You managed to dig out your chip,  _ that  _ was the kind of hunter that’d drag you back. Fett’s the stuff of a slave’s nightmares.”

“And he’s  _ dead,”  _ Din said, holding up the vambrace. “Or, not so impressive enough to have kept his own armor. When’s the last time you heard anything about him?”

“... I don’t know. Since Jabba died,” Vanth said. “A lotta people there, you didn’t hear from again. But that was just speculation of whatever happened.”

“Whatever did, he doesn’t have this armor anymore. How long since you bought it?”

“Five years,” Vanth said, quieting down.

“Five years and he never came for it. We’re not on Tatooine anymore.”

Vanth reached out to grab the gauntlet, but he didn’t put it back on. Instead, he looked down at it, pressing the button again to turn it off. He bit into his lip and looked at his cuirass with an expression of discomfort like he no longer wanted to have it on. He looked outside at the rain and Din sighed.

“Vanth,” he said.

“Is it possible to track down your armor?” Vanth asked. “If you lost it, could you find it again?”

“I couldn’t,” Din said. He frowned. “If I’ve lost my armor, it was stripped off my body.”

“If you were alive, then.”

“If I were alive and without my armor, I wouldn’t be a Mandalorian anymore. I couldn’t track it and wear it again.”

Vanth scowled at him. “Humor me, would you?”

Din sighed. “It’s possible to track armor, yes,” he said. “With access to small tech, you could track each piece if it were sold as parts. I suppose. But you’ve been in Mos Pelgo for years without Fett showing up. The man is probably dead, and even if he came for it, he  _ isn’t  _ a Mandalorian anymore. The armor is yours.”

The child was asleep at his shoulder and Din turned away, easing him back down into the crib. The baby’s eyes peeked open, looking up at him, before closing again. Din ran a thumb over his cheek before tucking the blanket around him. He smiled to himself, watching the boy’s chest rise and fall, and turned around. Vanth was staring at him, brows furrowed slightly, but as Din turned his eyes dropped back down to the vambrace.

“What?” Din said.

“I’m not a Mandalorian, either,” Vanth said. “It’s not mine. Not by your rules. I haven’t sworn your creed.”

“You plan to,” Din said. “... Unless—”

“No,” Vanth said quickly. “I just — I don’t feel like I’ve…  _ earned  _ it properly. Not until I’ve sworn.”

For a moment, Din was quiet. He took a step, leaning onto one hip, and flexed his fingers as the thoughts ran through his head. He thought of the child in the crib, the mythosaur that sat beneath his own armor on a string. He let out a breath. “You won’t,” he said. “Earn it. I haven’t.” He paused again. “... The Mandalorians rescued me as a child. Since then, I still keep trying to earn it.”

Vanth watched him before his eyes flickered down. His tongue darted out over his lower lip, then he slipped the vambrace back on. It closed around his forearm with a solid  _ click  _ and he looked up at Din. “Makes two of us, then,” he said.

Din smiled.

As the rains disappeared again and the temperatures rose, Sorgan felt hot and humid. While the armor could work to cool Din down, the village was feeling the effects, and all but Vanth seemed sluggish. It drove the kids towards the lake to cool down and Din was happy to have a reason to work on the swimming lessons.

“That’s too far.”

Din looked up. Further down on the shore, on the other side of a large rock, the kids were laughing and shouting as they splashed and jumped into the water. On their side, where it was calmer, he stood with the water up to his ankles. The wet sands felt odd between his toes, his boots and socks left higher on the shore and his pants rolled up. He was lighter without every weapon strapped to his person.

Exposed.

Vanth was looking at the lake with trepidation. His pants were rolled up as well, sleeves of a thin shirt folded to just above his elbows. The hem fluttered in the breeze, armor set aside.

“It’s not that far,” Din said. “You can tread water.”

“If I can’t stand, it’s too far.”

Din turned and leaned back against the rock. He glanced towards Omera, who sat on a blanket in the shade of the trees. She was talking to Laka, another villager, as both women kept an eye on the kids. Omera looked towards him and smiled, the baby in her lap, and he nodded back before taking in a breath. Vanth followed his gaze with a frown.

“You’re not going to learn to swim if you stay where it’s shallow,” Din said.

“... Fine,” Vanth said.

Din stepped further into the water and it came up past his ankles, knees, to his waist. Vanth followed, slower, lifting his arms and drawing in a breath at the cold. It came to his chest before he held in air and dunked himself beneath, coming back up quick with his eyes squeezed shut. Din turned and let himself lurch into the water, kicking to float backwards and further out. Vanth watched him and let out a huff.

“I’m more likely to sink than you when I have armor on,” Din said. “Come on.”

Vanth had a hesitant expression. The fabric of his shirt clung to his skin. But he waded out further before pushing off, quick to begin treading. Din watched him and the nervousness on his face and the stiffness with how he moved. While he wasn’t drowning, he certainly had no comfort in the water, not for a while yet.

“Relax,” Din said. “You’re okay. You’re wasting energy like that.”

“Like what—“

Din kicked back towards the shore until his feet touched sand and he turned. “Here,” he said, and held out his hand. Vanth grimaced, then paddled forward until he could reach out and grab it. Din drew him in closer. “Just tread. The way I showed you. You don’t have heavy weight, you don’t have to work so hard.”

It was slow, but Vanth began to relax. He let out a breath and, though it took a moment, some of the tension left. He began to tread with less difficulty, less panic, letting himself float more. Din nodded, and Vanth smiled. An excited yell drew their attention and they looked over as Winta and another boy took a running start off the rock, jumping into the water.

“See?” Din said. “Water’s fun.”

“They can  _ swim,”  _ Vanth huffed.

“We’re working on it.”

Vanth rolled his eyes but as they settled into silence, he was treading calmly. Din watched, taking a step back, and Vanth allowed a slight smile. Din nodded. “Good,” he said. “That’s better. You want to try strokes again?”

Vanth hesitated. “Sure.”

Din reached out and Vanth grabbed his hand. With kicks and one arm, he brought them towards the rock, and once Vanth could stand he let go and instead grabbed onto the stone. He took a deep breath and Din backed up. Vanth stayed in place, a hand on the rock and an arm outstretched into the water. He shrunk back towards the rock before pushing forward.

“Glide—“ Din said.

The strokes weren’t pretty. Or very fast — it was a more casual form of freestyle, turning completely with each stroke, shoulders above water. Just as Vanth reached him, he backed up. Vanth only took one more stroke before he looked up and sucked in a breath. “Hey—“

“Keep coming.”

“You’re  _ moving—“ _

“Come on.”

Vanth huffed and took another stroke. Din moved back. The marshal glared at him, letting out small, panting breaths. They came a little further, and further still, Din backing up continuously. Vanth looked up again and grimaced. He started to sink, then, righting himself too much, before he stood on the dirt below and let out a tired huff.  _ “Mando.” _

“Look how far you went,” Din said, and he lifted his arm from the water to gesture behind Vanth. Vanth turned. It was almost twice the distance Vanth had managed before.

“... Oh,” Vanth said.

“Break?”

“Yeah.”

Both turned. Din side-dove into the water, starting an easy stroke towards the shore, and Cobb followed. As they were able to stand better, the water coming to their thighs, they started out of the water. The sand stuck to their feet and the breeze felt cold as they walked up towards Omera and Laka. Omera looked up at them, squinting against the sun, and held up a towel. “It’s looking good,” she said with a smile.

“Thanks,” Cobb muttered. Din handed him the towel, instead bending down to wring out the bottom of his pants. The exposed skin, cooled now by the water and the wind, felt odd and he rolled the fabric back down. As he looked up, both Omera and Cobb were watching him, both looking away as he straightened. Omera shifted over, offering the spot beside her on the blanket, as Cobb turned away and wiped his face off with the towel. Frowning at both, Din settled down on the blanket.

The baby had settled on the blanket on Omera’s other side, napping away in the sun, but now awoke. He made a soft, sleepy coo, peering at Din from where he laid, and began to get up. He wandered over and put his hands against Din’s thigh, only to pull back at the distinct wetness of his pants. He whined.

Omera turned, opening her mouth to speak, when Winta came running up. She still had a smile on her face, another girl following at her back, and Omera sat up. “Having fun?” she asked, reaching out for Winta’s hand. Winta smiled and nodded, dripping with water, and hugged herself against the cold of the breeze. She glanced at Din, her smile turning nervous, and shifted back and forth on her feet. The child, sitting beside Din, cooed at her.

“Ask them,” Omera said.

Winta covered her smile with a hand as though hiding. Omera gave her hand a squeeze and Din nodded, waiting. Finally Winta straightened up. “You have… jetpacks,” she said.

“Yes,” Din said.

“Could you…” She fell quiet. Din had an inkling of what she wanted to ask, but waited, and Omera nodded. “Could you drop us in the water?”

Din shifted. His first thought was that it would be a waste of fuel, depending on how long the kids wanted to do it for. They only had so much stored on the Crest, and was a resource they’d have to fly off-planet for. But Omera smiled at Winta, then looked to him, and Winta mirrored the smile too with hope on her face. “Please?” she asked.

His second thought was that he had his own memories of his  _ buir  _ doing such a thing and that Sorgan only had so much entertainment. With a nod, he looked down at the kid and gave his ears a stroke before he got up. “Okay,” he said. “Sure.”

Winta grinned and he walked towards their pile of armor, grabbing his jetpack, and slid it into place on his back. They started down towards the water and Winta skipped along until they came to a stop. “Ready?” he said, and Winta turned towards him with a nod. For a moment, he hesitated, unsure of how to hold her. He let out a sigh and stepped forward, scooping her into his arms, and Winta let out a surprised gasp and a laugh. “Alright.”

Her arms wrapped around his neck and he took a step, lowered down, before pushing off. The jetpack flared and shot him into the air and Winta let out a shriek, arms tightening before she remembered to let go. Quickly, they were out and above the water, and he let her go. She shrieked again, landing in the water with a splash. The other kids let out amazed shouts and Din circled back around, landing on the rock, to walk back towards the sand. As his boots hit ground again, he looked towards Omera and Vanth. Both were smiling, the baby starting to walk over with big eyes.

Suddenly, Din was surrounded by excited children, and he took a step back. “Uh, one at a time,” he said with a smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things get a bit more complicated.
> 
> TY for all the love and feedback. It feeds me <3! 
> 
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